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Masked/Unmasked doll

Masked/Unmasked doll published on No Comments on Masked/Unmasked doll

I’ve been pining over the limited edition outfit that comes with SoulDoll Evelyn — she has a mask!

 

I like the doll, as she’s an OMV, but I mostly like the concept of a doll with a mask even more. In fact, what would be severely cool would be a doll with a mask like Evelyn’s, only painted up to look all translucent and realistic an’ shit [i.e., like the type of sublte, layered faceup that I don’t do at all]. The mask would be magnetic, removable to see the doll’s actual head. The doll’s actual face would be this planed-down, sealed-off, empty-eyed, creepy-deepy-doo [yup, it’s a new adjective] mask of which I have a digital model by RetroDevil.

Nifty idea, but I’m struggling with the execution. Namely, where do I get a mask? I’m thinking it would probably be a faceplate with the back ground out some more to accommodate the non-removable face. Hmmmm, what standard-issue 1:3 scale BJDs have faceplates?

Doll playlist

Doll playlist published on No Comments on Doll playlist
  • Barbie Girl by Aqua. Witty, catchy, and slyly addressing the Madonna/whore dichotomy! What more could you ask for?
  • Coin Operated Boy by the Dresden Dolls. Overwrought, but still insightful and memorable, especially with plinky-plonky piano. Also Brian Viglione is really hot.
  • Close to You by the Carpenters. Because of the scene in Mirrormask [linked in song title] in which those clockwork gynoids dollify Helena to the tune. Get away from me with your creepy Objectification Dust [TM], robots!
  • Fake Plastic Trees by Radiohead. Metaphorical dolls. Close enough.
  • China Girl by David Bowie. Double entendre dolls with more Objectification Dust and bonus racism!
  • Rent by the Pet Shop Boys. Willfully trying to confuse money and possession with love and acceptance and, on occasion, succeeding in this self-delusion.
  • Columbine by David Bowie. The first 1:40 of this mournful video, which is apparently part of a pantomime, Pierrot in Turquoise, that David Bowie created and starred in around 1967. Mimes have always reminded me of dolls.
  • Toy Soldier by David Bowie. Another song from the same era as Columbine. It’s like a nursery rhyme mashed up with Velvet Underground’s Venus in Furs, from which he lifted most of the chorus. The result is as funny, disturbing, and downright weird as you would expect.
  • Under My Thumb by the Rolling Stones. We’re not dealing with Objectification Dust here, folks. We’re dealing with Objectification Cement.
  • More to come.

“I’m a blond bimbo girl / In a fantasy world…”

“I’m a blond bimbo girl / In a fantasy world…” published on No Comments on “I’m a blond bimbo girl / In a fantasy world…”

I didn’t really know the lyrics to Aqua’s dance hit Barbie Girl until today when I watched the video. Both the lyrics and the video crack me up. I love the way that the main verses make repeated obvious reference to sexual activities, like undressing, kissing, touching, even blatant “hanky panky,” but the chorus insists that Barbie and Ken’s main activity is partying. Yeah right…the video demonstrates that Rene Dif’s Ken is trying to get into Lene Nystrom’s Barbie’s pants.

I also like Nystrom’s delivery. She sings in a simpering falsetto that accentuates the non-sexual aspect of all the proposed activities. In fact, her Barbie seems more interested in stereotypes of romantic love [“You can touch / You can play / If you say / I’m always yours”] and has very little awareness of the double entendres of her lines. The closest she comes is when she says, “I can act like a star / I can beg on my knees,” whereupon she looks over her sunglasses with an expression that could possibly be knowing or conspiratorial if her character weren’t so blithely uninterested in sexual objectification for the rest of the video. Ken’s the one rolling his eyes and winking at the audience, while Barbie is busy petting the dog, roller skating, and thinking of true love. She’s illustrating the interpretation of doll qua child’s toy, and he’s illustrating doll qua sex toy. Of course, the whole song’s constant emphasis on contrafactuality [“Imagination / Life is your creation,” “…In a fantasy world,” “I can act like a star”] points out that both concepts of dolls are overheated stereotypes created by heterosexual dudes who are not interested in relating to actual, real, complex women, so it’s a sly critique masquerading as a poppy dance hit.

I like smart songs about dolls! 

 

 

Word of the day: vasistas

Word of the day: vasistas published on No Comments on Word of the day: vasistas

I was looking up how to spell “Was ist das?” and found that a word derived therefrom, the French “vasistas,” refers to small windows in doors of houses in Germany, through which people look to see who’s calling. The word comes from the phrase with which German people answer the door: “Was ist das?” I love it — it’s the French equivalent of calling a peephole a hellothere.

Billy Idol’s Dancing With Myself music video is a gas!

Billy Idol’s Dancing With Myself music video is a gas! published on No Comments on Billy Idol’s Dancing With Myself music video is a gas!

In this video, Billy Idol prances around on a junky, post-apocalyptic sound stage, proclaiming how he’s all alone. As he continues posturing and sneering in a hammy, macho manner, fans [?] dressed in grey, ragged clothes scale the walls and attempt to reach him, but he zaps them all away with electricity and continues to assert that he’s dancing with himself dammit! Undaunted, the fans climb up the walls again, gather around him on the sound stage, and start seriously boogeying down. Billy Idol ends the song insisting that he’s still all by his lonesome, but the effect of this statement is diminished by the sweet moves of the fans around him.

 

P.S. Yes, I am also aware of the misogynist themes in this video, like the silhouette of the chained woman dancing and the man sharpening his razor in preparation for killing her.

In case I needed another reason to find Duran Duran’s Hungry Like the Wolf objectionable…

In case I needed another reason to find Duran Duran’s Hungry Like the Wolf objectionable… published on No Comments on In case I needed another reason to find Duran Duran’s Hungry Like the Wolf objectionable…

…I just saw the music video for the first time, and it’s one of the purest, most horrible depictions I’ve seen of Brown People As Props On Great White Hunter’s [Misogynist, Racist, Objectifying] Journey. The singer, who’s not only white, but also dressed in white, just in case we forgot he’s white, mouths the lyrics while plowing through crowds of subcontinental Indians. He grows increasingly irritated as people keep him from shoving his way through the crowd. I like to imagine that all the extras aren’t following the direction to obstruct the singer, but instead are pretending to go about their daily business, unimpressed by some white dude who thinks that the world should clear a path for his penis. Quick cuts reveal that he’s chasing after an African woman, who inexplicably has pointless designs painted on her brows and cheeks. The end up in the leaves of a swampy forest, rolling around. I think they’re supposed to be contending, but the slow motion just makes it seem like they’re doing some sort of badly coordinated tumbling routine. Brilliant.

 

On a purely cinematographical level, this video also fails miserably because it’s filmed during the daytime. However, the first lines of the song — “Dark in the city / Night is a wire / Steam in the subway / Alleys afire” — describe an evocative setting in which the exhalations from the underground mirror the singer’s panting, while the fire in the dead ends links into his energy and urgency. Also I would like to point out that this song happens at night, which heightens the whole singer=wolf metaphor by connoting wolves baying at the moon. The nocturnal setting is essential to the song, but the video discards it in favor of daylight for no apparent reason. Why? They couldn’t wait a few hours? They didn’t have enough spotlights? Who knows? This music video stinks all around.

Today’s word is “cockernonnie.”

Today’s word is “cockernonnie.” published on No Comments on Today’s word is “cockernonnie.”

While I was poking around on Wikipedia for information about Gibson Girl bouffants, I followed a link on that page to one on the chignon, which advised me to “see also: cockernonnie.” Of course, since I have never laid eyes on a cockernonnie before, I felt compelled to follow Wikipedia’s advice in hopes of finding out what one looked like. Wikipedia had the grace to inform me that a cockernonnie was a historical Scottish women’s chignon, also known as a “cock-up,” which is, as we all know, British slang for a complete mess. However, though a cockernonnie may also be referred to as a cock-up, cock-up qua mistake does not derive from cock-up qua hairstyle. And still, after all that, I have no idea what a cockernonnie looks like! Woe is me!

 

On a tangentially related subject, I think “cockernonnie” would make a great insult. Like “nincompoop,” it has vaguely scatological associations, a satisfying plosive at the end of the first syllable, and a wonderful roll off the tongue. The loose association with “cock > dick > dickhead” and the loose homonymy with “ninny” both make “cockernonnie” sound like a word that refers to someone who is rude, arrogant, and offensive in their inane, asinine behavior. Yup, “cockernonnie” is ripe for repurposing…

Let me tell you about U.S. women’s hairstyles of the fin de [19ieme] siecle…

Let me tell you about U.S. women’s hairstyles of the fin de [19ieme] siecle… published on No Comments on Let me tell you about U.S. women’s hairstyles of the fin de [19ieme] siecle…

Around the turn of the 20th century, women pursued two ideals when dressing their hair. The first was VOLUME. The second was CURLS. Even a cursory glance over photos, drawings, and other ephemera of the period shows lofty, complicated updos. Women labored carefully to achieve such styles, setting and curling their hair, teasing it up over rats to give it more height, adding hairpieces, etc., etc. Such hairstyles reached their popular apotheosis in the satirical and yet idealized sketches of Charles Gibson, creator of the Gibson Girl, whose look, at once haughty and casually tousled, bespoke an independent and athletic New Woman. In the same way that big hair of the late 1980s and early 1990s correlated with women’s increasingly large presence in corporation positions of power, so the big hair of a century earlier arguably connoted women’s agitation to take up more space in the world. Also it looked really cool.

 

As much as I love big hair from any period, I lament the difficulty of finding digital models of it. Therefore I’m glad to report that I just yesterday figured out how to construct a CGI Gibson Girl bouffant! I used two instances of goldtassel’s lovely Edwardian Hair for Gen1 and G2F. One I pushed beyond the limits of its morphs to achieve the correct voluminous silhouette; the other I used as fill. Jareth illustrates the results below.Continue reading Let me tell you about U.S. women’s hairstyles of the fin de [19ieme] siecle…

Heavenly Pant[r]y

Heavenly Pant[r]y published on No Comments on Heavenly Pant[r]y

E-mail circulated on Friday on a departmental mailing list to which I subscribe:

 

I love our team!

In the spirit of serving our communities…my girls school is hosting a non-food drive for the Heavenly Panty in Essex Junction that serves a lot of our local communities. Some of these items are hard for food pantry’s to get – yet are still very much needed by our neighbors. If you are so inclined….feel free to drop items off with me and I will get them to the Heavenly Pantry.  [details]

E-mail circulated two minutes later, flagged with high importance:

HEAVENLY PANTRY PEOPLE NOT PANTY!!

(crawling into a hole now)

Ringdoll Zombie Amy engages philosophical questions on the nature of decay.

Ringdoll Zombie Amy engages philosophical questions on the nature of decay. published on No Comments on Ringdoll Zombie Amy engages philosophical questions on the nature of decay.

Ringdoll Zombie Amy has come off her preorder and is now on regular sale until the end of January. Ringdoll has put up some more detailed pictures as well. Of course, none of them are unpainted, but they do confirm that she has a face embedded in her viscera where her navel would be. Why? I don’t know. I also don’t know why she is splattered with yellow stuff that looks like dried rubber cement.

 

I’m still not sure whether to get her. I still maintain that a decomposing dryad [with a sapling growing out of her eye socket!!] is a wonderful, hilarious concept that I could execute with great skill, panache, and satisfaction. However, whenever I think about getting the doll, I inevitably think of her “red paint and rubber cement” look, and it just grosses me out. I can’t tell whether I’m balking at artistic engagement with rot and decomposition and/or if I’m just really turned off by the default paint job.

 

Time to do some concept art…

Doll successes and frustrations this weekend

Doll successes and frustrations this weekend published on No Comments on Doll successes and frustrations this weekend

In successes, Submit’s Hujoo Wings body in apricot came on Friday. I narrowed the neck to fit her head socket, trimmed down the feet so they could fit into her glittery shoes, and wired her arms. The apricot plastic matches with the color of her resin well, and the proportions work very well; she now looks like she’s between 8 and 10 instead of between 6 and 8. With more evenly distributed weight, a jointed torso, single-jointed elbows, and double-jointed knees, she has much greater stability and articulation than she did in her original form.Continue reading Doll successes and frustrations this weekend

“PEEK unt!”: or, using words I can’t pronounce correctly

“PEEK unt!”: or, using words I can’t pronounce correctly published on No Comments on “PEEK unt!”: or, using words I can’t pronounce correctly

I love the word “piquant,” but it’s one that I have learned only through reading. No one besides me uses it aloud, so I have always said it as “peek CON[T],” that is, in the French way, with the stress on the second syllable. This always sounded wrong, but I couldn’t for the life of me figure out the right pronunciation. Nor did I bother to look it up.

I ended up researching the correct pronunciation this morning. Turns out that the stress should be on the first syllable, both in English [“PEEK unt”] and French [“PEE con(t)”]. I will be pronouncing it “PEE con[t]” from now on.

Cranberry Orange Relish That Makes Your Kitchen Look Like Something Died in It

Cranberry Orange Relish That Makes Your Kitchen Look Like Something Died in It published on No Comments on Cranberry Orange Relish That Makes Your Kitchen Look Like Something Died in It

Adapted from a recipe passed down from my mom’s mom to her and then to me. So named because I used an antique meat grinder to mince the fruit, and red pulpy stuff, as well as gruesome-looking drips, got everywhere. This is lots of fun to make, at least with a manual grinder, as the fruit [cranberries especially] pops and squishes in a very satisfying manner upon being crushed by the corkscrew.

12 oz. cranberries, either fresh or frozen
6 mandarin oranges
1 cup sugar

Mince the cranberries with a meat grinder or food processor. Peel oranges, remove pith, quarter, and do the same. Put the glop in a bowl. Mix in sugar. Refrigerate for at least 4 hours [up to 4 days] so that flavors can meld.

“Doing a Devo,” or, What Goes On in My Imagination

“Doing a Devo,” or, What Goes On in My Imagination published on No Comments on “Doing a Devo,” or, What Goes On in My Imagination

I rarely share in public what goes on with the characters in my head, but this is one of the more innocuous events.

For context, I got Whip It by Devo stuck in my head, which is clearly a goofy set of puns, even if you haven’t seen the video. Then I started thinking about Jareth’s workplace, which is mostly your basic corporate office, except for the fact that the business, the Mortal Coil [yes, thank you very much — I like the name too] sells party space, scene space, kinky equipment, and bdsm services. [And that’s one of the ways you can tell it’s imaginary — because such a company would never exist anywhere in Vermont. :p ]

Sadine is the Coil’s rock star domme who brings in so much business that she gets her own assistant, which is Jareth. It’s mostly executive assistant work, with a ton of calendar management. Lately, though, she’s been getting a lot of really low-quality crap from the web content specialists who are ghosting her blog copy, and so we begin our vignette…Continue reading “Doing a Devo,” or, What Goes On in My Imagination

Touralyn, a unique 1:6 scale BJD

Touralyn, a unique 1:6 scale BJD published on No Comments on Touralyn, a unique 1:6 scale BJD

Ever since DragonGems started coming to VTDL meetups, I’ve watched her dollmaking skills develop rapidly. That said, I’ve always particularly liked her second 1:6 scale BJD, an elf, who first showed up to doll club on May 18th, 2013.Continue reading Touralyn, a unique 1:6 scale BJD

Made Honorine a night cap tonight…

Made Honorine a night cap tonight… published on No Comments on Made Honorine a night cap tonight…

I stitched together 4 triangles, each measuring 0.5 inches along the base [plus seam allowance], as her head circumference is ~2 inches. I turned it inside out, added slits for her ears, and stuck it on her head with sticky tack. The waffle pattern on the fabric and the perky shape put me in mind of a hat made out of a leaf, although Honorine, along with her fellow denizens of 1 12th Street, is adamant that she’s not some cute little pixie. [That’s why she looks annoyed — too many 1:1 scale people have said, “Awwww, how precious!”]

 

Continue reading Made Honorine a night cap tonight…

If you ever want to weep for the fate of humanity…

If you ever want to weep for the fate of humanity… published on No Comments on If you ever want to weep for the fate of humanity…

…go watch I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change, a so-called musical comedy revue, the music for which we can blame on Joe DiPietro and the script on Jimmy Roberts. Wikipedia says that this is the second-longest running off Broadway musical, which makes me respond with the same exclamation that I had after reading Best Loved Poems of the American People: “Wow, the American people have no taste.”

I Love You is basically a laundry list of all the stereotypes associated with modern heteronormative relationships, from dating, to marriage, to having kids, to growing old, all expressed in their most formulaic banalities, set to pointless, unoriginal arrangements that add nothing to the story, such as it is. The reliance on a variety of sketches, united by theme, rather than compelling, engaging characters, shows up the tedious, threadbare nature of the cliches at play. I’m not sure why it’s called a comedy, as it highlights the self-loathing, desperation, and barely concealed hostility that motivate the modern heteronormative narrative. Hah hah. Real funny.

 

P.S. I have to say, though, that I did like the part that went something like this:

 

“Did you put the boys to bed?”

“Yeah.”

“How’d you do it so fast?”

“Told ’em we were going to Disney World.”

 

“You bribed them with promises of Disney World?!”

 

“I couldn’t help it — they were throwing the goldfish at each other. –I figure we’ll just wait a few months, then tell ’em it burned down.”

Doll work and acquisitions this weekend: a little Honorine, mostly Christmas crap

Doll work and acquisitions this weekend: a little Honorine, mostly Christmas crap published on No Comments on Doll work and acquisitions this weekend: a little Honorine, mostly Christmas crap

Besides hosting the monthly VTDL meetup yesterday, I also worked a bit on dolls today. Honorine got wiring in her limbs, as well as a comfy outfit of pajamas and slippers.Continue reading Doll work and acquisitions this weekend: a little Honorine, mostly Christmas crap

Vermont Doll Lovers meetup, 11/14/2015

Vermont Doll Lovers meetup, 11/14/2015 published on No Comments on Vermont Doll Lovers meetup, 11/14/2015

Submit, along with Jujube, Dorothy, and Jeff, attended yesterday’s VTDL meetup. House Rainbow Barf made an appearance as well. Pictures on the VTDL blog.

Modern Wizard’s stream-of-consciousness pea soup redux

Modern Wizard’s stream-of-consciousness pea soup redux published on No Comments on Modern Wizard’s stream-of-consciousness pea soup redux

Making the stream-of-consciousness pea soup again today with some revisions.

 

1 lb. ground beef.

1 lb. dry yellow split peas.

2 carrots, sliced. 6 carrots, sliced.

 

1 white onion, diced.

2 potatoes, cubed.

3 packets Herbox bouillon in 6 cups warm water. 6 cups water.

1/2 tsp. pepper.

1/2 tsp. thyme. 3 tsp. thyme.

Somewhere between 1/2 and 1 tsp. cumin.
2 tsp. cumin.

1 tsp. parsley.

1 tsp. salt.

6 hulking garlic cloves, minced. 8 hulking garlic cloves, minced.

Brown the meat with the garlic. Do not put the garlic in the slow cooker with all the other ingredients, as this neutralizes most of the flavor.

Cook for 7 hours on high until peas have disintegrated, stirring regularly to distribute spices.

Submit previews her new clothes and body!

Submit previews her new clothes and body! published on No Comments on Submit previews her new clothes and body!

Wow, when was the last time I did a doll photostory that wasn’t Zville? Here’s Submit getting a sneak peek at the type of body to which she will soon be transferred — one with greater poseability that also happens to be a bit taller. Swappable faceplates are perfect for photostories that depend on reaction shots, like this one… 😀

 

Continue reading Submit previews her new clothes and body!

Modern Wizard’s stream-of-consciousness slow cooker pea soup

Modern Wizard’s stream-of-consciousness slow cooker pea soup published on No Comments on Modern Wizard’s stream-of-consciousness slow cooker pea soup

Adapted from RelatedByFoodJustAddWine’s Slow Cooker Newfoundland Pea Soup. Stream of consciousness in italics adds insight into my cooking philosophy [such as it is] and practice.
Pea soup seemed  like a good thing to make in a slow cooker. It’s dense and sludgy, so it should stand up for several leftover meals.

Nope, not putting a ham bone in, even though it would be delicious. I don’t eat pigs.
Grocery store had no salt beef in stock, so that was out too, which was probably just as well, since it’s loaded with unnecessary salt. Decided that ground beef + garlic could serve just as well.

Also celery is an abomination in the eyes of the Lord. NO CELERY.

 

 

1 lb. ground beef.

1 lb. dry yellow split peas. Not sure why they have to be yellow, but there they are. Also not sure why they were in the “Mexican” aisle of the grocery store. Dividing up the grocery store along geographical and ethnic lines doesn’t make sense to me. Original amount was 2 cups, but that would have left just a little of the bag left over, so I put in the whole bag.

2 carrots, sliced.

 

1 white onion, diced. Or a big onion of any type, really. I’m not picky.

2 potatoes, cubed. Any kind of potatoes, except for sweet.

3 packets Herbox bouillon in 6 cups warm water. Original recipe calls for 6 cups, more or less, of chicken broth. The water part of the broth is obviously a necessary addition, but the chicken part seems to be there just for flavor. I mean, this recipe certainly doesn’t need any more sodium, which is why I go for Herbox, a salt-free chicken boullion powder. 6 packets Herbox + 6 cups water seems like chicken broth overkill, so I halved the bouillon.

1/2 tsp. pepper. Or just crank the pepper mill over the slow cooker until it looks like enough has been ground in.

1/2 tsp. thyme. All measurements start off with the intention of exactitude, but then err in either direction, depending on how messily I pour the spices into the measuring spoons.

Somewhere between 1/2 and 1 tsp. cumin. A large hunk of cumin jumped into the pot when I was measuring. Cumin was not in original recipe, but I added it because, after my experience with tomato-based chicken veggie stew, I realized that cumin improves lots of dishes!

1 tsp. parsley. Parsley, on the other hand, is of dubious value, unless fresh.

1 tsp. salt. Just salt until it’s well salted.

6 hulking garlic cloves, minced. I was trying to use up a head on the verge of turning green. Also you can never have too much garlic!!

Thaw ground beef. Mince garlic; mix in with beef. Brown beef; drain.

Put all ingredients in slow cooker; cook on high for 3 hours, stirring occasionally. Poke soup after three hours; taste and realize that peas have not disintegrated and flavors have not mingled.

Add more salt, pepper, and thyme. Turn down to low; cook on low for 5 more hours until peas have disintegrated. Get up at 2:00 AM; discover that soup has reached state of optimum sludge. Sample approvingly. Put in plastic storage container; wash dishes; go back to bed, looking forward to soup the next night.

Entry will be updated after serious taste testing tonight.

EDIT: This stuff is really good. It can be eaten hot or cold, and it’s especially good with savory bread — we ate it with garlic and cheese breadsticks last night, and tonight I’m going to pair it with a rosemary chive roll. It starts out porridgey, but then, as the excess water evaporates, it turns to the consistency of [delicious] cement. If you look up “hearty” in the dictionary, there is a picture of my pea soup. The flavors, like the peas themselves, disintegrate and blend over the course of cooking, so I could probably put more garlic and cumin in it without harming the taste. I was right in my assumption, however, that other spices compensate for a lack of salt; this soup needs no additional salt.

The kid is back: the return of Submit’s original form [a.k.a. Tiny Elfdolls are endearing!]

The kid is back: the return of Submit’s original form [a.k.a. Tiny Elfdolls are endearing!] published on No Comments on The kid is back: the return of Submit’s original form [a.k.a. Tiny Elfdolls are endearing!]

Submit’s original form — an Elfdoll Hana — arrived in the mail today. I popped on the smirky faceplate, dressed her in her clothes, and posed her for a few triumphal photos. The photos demonstrate the extent of her elbow flexibility, as well as her need to be propped up by the backdrop wall [small feet and long, heavy torso make her unbalanced]. Adorable she definitely is, but she really needs a better body with double joints and modern engineering.Continue reading The kid is back: the return of Submit’s original form [a.k.a. Tiny Elfdolls are endearing!]

Things I picture lumberjacks wearing…

Things I picture lumberjacks wearing… published on No Comments on Things I picture lumberjacks wearing…

…include the following:

  • steel-toed boots
  • wool socks
  • hard hats
  • leather work gloves with padded palms
  • rip-stop pants reinforced with grommets
  • sweaty T-shirts

Things I do not picture lumberjacks wearing include the following:

  • poet’s blouses that have never seen a day’s sweat in their lives
  • pointless little vests that don’t do anything
  • pants with integrated codpieces
  • boots with useless straps
  • no gloves
  • no head protection

In other words, I don’t picture them wearing anything like the Lumberjack outfit included in the Genesis 2 Male Starter Essentials by Daz Studio. However, I must admit that the outfit is hilarious in its impracticality and thus perfect for Jareth, who likes entertaining and impractical outfits.Continue reading Things I picture lumberjacks wearing…

Localized temporal distortion??

Localized temporal distortion?? published on No Comments on Localized temporal distortion??

Me to my boss today [deadpan]: I have a very serious, pressing question: How did it get to be 11:45 already?

 

Her [deadpan]: We’re in a time warp. We went through the wormhole and came out the other end.

 

Me: Like in Wayne’s World. [makes appropriate sound effects]

Of course, since I often have meta-thoughts, especially about language, I got to wondering what exactly a time warp is, what it sounds like, and the history of its development as a pop cultural shorthand for a perception that time is moving more quickly or more slowly than usual. I have no definite answers, but I think the signature sound of the TARDIS on Doctor Who, as well as the show’s theme song [2003 version linked], not to mention the RHPS song Time Warp, will inflect the results. Stay tuned.

Welcome back, Submit!

Welcome back, Submit! published on No Comments on Welcome back, Submit!

One of my most favorite dolls has always been the first inresination of Submit. I first purchased her as an Elfdoll Hana Devil back in March, 2007. This doll was a realistically proportioned 1:6 scale kid with four swappable faceplaces: neutral open-eyed, happy and smiling, pouting, and sleeping. As evidenced by my first photostory with her, she swiftly developed her own adorable, indomitable personality. Though I clearly enjoyed changing her expressions as needed, I quickly learned that the smirky one best reflected her general demeanor.

 

I sold Submit 1.0 just two months later to pay expenses, but always regretted getting rid of her. About a year and a half later, in November, 2007, I brought her back as another Elfdoll of the same size, but with a different headsculpt: Doona Kathlen. Obviously her personality is no different, but the Kathlen sculpt lacks that mischievous spark that so endeared me to Hana. It doesn’t perfectly represent Submit the way that the smirky Hana faceplate does.

Recently I got the idea to improve Submit’s articulation because, even though she’s excruciatingly cute in the headsculpt department, her body is just basic. While Delmar, a Leekeworld Gift Project Little Mermaid, suffers from laziness, Submit, by contrast, suffers from inadequately distributed focus. I seriously theorize that Rainmain expended so much creative energy on the expressive faceplates for Hana that he did a super basic, single-jointed body — functional but utterly pedestrian. The body also features some weird aesthetic choices, particularly a long, solid, unjointed torso, which, when combined with the short, stubby limbs, makes the doll imbalanced. On her original body, Submit can’t do much besides change expressions.

Thus I started thinking about either moving Submit’s head to a different body or hybridizing her to give her some better poseability. As I explore options for her upgrade, I realized that I would really rather have and upgraded Submit with a Hana sculpt instead of a Kathlen sculpt.

Just as I realized this, an Elfdoll Hana Angel [same as the Devil in all respects, except for the included costume] showed up on Ebay. I just won the auction, including the doll, all faceplates, default faceups, eyes, certificate of authenticity, and outfit [except for underwear] for a rockin’ $165.78 including shipping. Given that I paid somewhere around $350.00 for Submit the first time that I got her as an Elfdoll Hana, her current price is the equivalent of a significant discount!

Anyway, I’m still uncertain about how to improve her articulation, but at least I have the most appropriate headsculpt for Submit now. Welcome back, kiddo!
 

Now we know what Stephenie Meyer thinks of 50 Shades.

Now we know what Stephenie Meyer thinks of 50 Shades. published on No Comments on Now we know what Stephenie Meyer thinks of 50 Shades.

After wondering Meyer’s opinion a while back on E.L. James’ series that started off as Twilight fanfic, I finally found an answer to that question. In a recent presentation at the New York Comic Con, Meyer tergiversated on the eventual release of Midnight Sun, apparently claiming that James’ Grey pissed her off so much that she changed her mind yet again on publishing Edward’s point of view. Meyer characterized the news that James had come out with Grey as “a literal flip the table moment.”

 

From this I deduce that [surprise surprise!] Meyer really dislikes 50 Poops. I’m sure Meyer takes offense that James co-opted Meyer’s cherished, chaste characters and reinterpreted them as people who can’t stop banging. Beyond that, however, Meyer also appears to be fuming because James got there first. In Meyer’s mind, the objectionable Twilight wannabe with her objectionable characters and objectionable ideas of sex has copied Meyer’s idea — a romance novel from the dude’s perspective — yet again. Meyer dislikes James for claiming attention and money that Meyer believes should be directed toward her. This is yet another case of Meyer acting like her books are a sacred extension of her self. Her lack of critical distance and self-reflection on her creations really drives me up the wall.

It came from the time warp: thoughts on Fox’s redo of The Rocky Horror Picture Show movie

It came from the time warp: thoughts on Fox’s redo of The Rocky Horror Picture Show movie published on No Comments on It came from the time warp: thoughts on Fox’s redo of The Rocky Horror Picture Show movie

Two thoughts: 1) Don’t do it in the first place.

2) If you do do it, do not cast Laverne Cox, a trans woman of color, as Frank, a role intimately associated with Tim Curry, white cis dude, because that makes some really problematic, sexist, transmisogynist equations between the identity of the person who plays the role [trans woman of color] and the hammy, draggy, stereotypically polymorphous perversion evinced by the character. Ultimately Frank ends up as the object of the movie’s jokes, scorn, and derision; plus he gets killed off. I fail to see anything progressive or revisionist in a trans woman of color playing a character whose objectification and murder make me think of all the trans women of color who fall victim each year to the incoherent “trans panic” bullshit.

Caelyn Sandel goes into some incisive detail on the subject on the Mary Sue.

 

Why does capitalism have such a rigid fetish for reactivating the dead past so it can lurch around in contextless, blunderful fashion, reopening old wounds and creating new ones by sheer virtue of anachronism?

Lucille Allen’s really easy applesauce recipe

Lucille Allen’s really easy applesauce recipe published on No Comments on Lucille Allen’s really easy applesauce recipe

APPLESAUCE by Lucille V. Allen — deli 10/2015!

Macintosh apples, peeled, cored, cut into quarters

5 oz. water

3 q. saucepan

Fill saucepan with apple parts and water. Cook for 20 minutes on medium with lid on. Stir. Poke. Cook for 20 more minutes on medium. Applesauce results.

Some notes on Stephenie Meyers’ Life and Death

Some notes on Stephenie Meyers’ Life and Death published on No Comments on Some notes on Stephenie Meyers’ Life and Death

I’ve started on Life and Death, Stephenie Meyers’ 10th-anniversary version of Twilight with Beau [human] and Edythe [vampire] instead of Bella and Edward. I’m not sure how far I’ll get with it, but I do have a few thoughts:

 

  • Life and Death is bound upside-down with a newly edited version of Twilight so that one can read one novel, then flip the book around and read another. I find this very distracting, as every line in LaD makes me want to compare it to the analogue in Twilight. Thus I’ve been juggling the book in a very time-consuming manner. To read LaD in the way that I would find most interesting would ideally require two E-readers side by side, one with each book on it.
  • Meyer claims on the first page of the foreword that she didn’t do Midnight Sun for the 10th anniversary because the “problem was time — as in, there wasn’t any. Certainly not enough to write a novel, or even half of one.” I don’t understand this protest of hers, as she clearly had time to write 387 pages of LaD. I suspect that she just didn’t want to write Midnight Sun because she was still angry that it was leaked online.
  • P. 4: Beau reports his mom’s unusual comment that he and she “look so much alike that I could use her for a shaving mirror.” Of course, he then goes on to describe his mother as very youthful in appearance, with pointy chin and full lips, which, he emphasizes, he does not share. We thus have a disjunction between his mom’s perception of his appearance and his own observations thereon. His mom’s kinda disturbing insistence on their similarities suggests that she is forcing some sort of identification between herself and her son that Beau’s not really feeling. Maybe she wishes she had a daughter? Of course, any sort of psychological ambivalence is probably just an artifact from Twilight, in which Bella and her mom do look similar. This comment of Beau’s mom illustrates Meyers’ superficial, search-and-replace approach to her rewrite; rather than thinking through the implications of how a [supposed] similarity might have different effects on mother and son instead of mother and daughter, Meyer just hits all the same notes in each case.
  • P. 7: Beau looks out the window at Forks: “It was probably beautiful or something. Everything was green: the trees were covered in moss, both the trunks and the branches, the ground blanketed with ferns. Even the air has turned green by the time it filtered down through the leaves. It was too green — an alien planet.” This paragraph reads as both wrong to me and not enough. We already know that Beau keenly observes appearances and aesthetics, so the sentence “It was probably beautiful or something” doesn’t make sense for the character. It sounds like a grudging admission from a more typical teenage kid who thinks aesthetics are bullshit. I imagine rather that he would appreciate that the land was beautiful in a certain way, but looked alien and ugly [and dank and forbidding?] in contrast to his hot, dry home state of Arizona. I’d rewrite something like this: “Everything was green: [blah blah blah]. Maybe it was beautiful to the people who lived here, but not to me. There was too much greenery, too much moisture, too many shadows. It was an alien planet compared to Arizona. I wished I was back home.”

Delmar salvaged

Delmar salvaged published on No Comments on Delmar salvaged

Finished cleaning Delmar today. Decided to retain all human [grey resin] parts, as well as yellow [probably once white] tailfin. I’m excluding her tail from hips to end joint, as they’re just so undetailed and poorly jointed that I wonder why Leekeworld even bothered. I plan to make Delmar a substitute tail of some more flexible material, but I am not sure what.Continue reading Delmar salvaged

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