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anime Archaeology audience participation awesome Berlin Colony comics commentary crack current events Deutsch email post ew work fail fannish things food games GANDAMUUU geeking out Gurren Lagann Hellen is a pervert Hourly Comics Day I am right and you are wrong I like books they are my friends IM lulz I require a new host body languages life linkage loot lulz memes 'n quizzes 'n things movies music picspam politics ponderings radio randomness rant religion school stuff the batcave travel tv ucl uni weather 日本語 All Tags Sometimes you just have to let the capslock flow, though, you know? It's good for the soul. Also, if anything's going to put me in a capslocking mood it's some good Holmes action.
So, I was on the Isle of Wight this weekend, and it was very nice and I'll post pictures later, but first:
I saw Sherlock on BBC1 tonight.
FFFFFFFF.
It was SO GOOD. EVEN CAPSLOCK IS INSUFFICIENT TO EXPRESS MY GLEE. SO WELL ADAPTED TO THE PRESENT DAY SETTING. (They use first names all the time, lol.) AND THE WRITING WAS SO GOOD. AND THE ACTING OMG. AND WITH THE TEXT ON THE SCREEN AND STUFF AH I LOVE IT. LOVE IT. I HAVE TO WAIT UNTIL NEXT SUNDAY FOR THE NEXT ONE? T__________T I'm gonna go find my Complete Sherlock Holmes and re-read the first case later.
I did kind of figure out who the killer was before anyone in the show, which was LAME. Maybe it's just because [SPOILER] those "Don't Take Unlicensed Minicabs" ads creep me the fuck out so I'm distrustful of cab drivers. Sorry cab drivers. >_> [/SPOILER] But really, it was kind of obvious, right? "Who do we trust even though we don't know them?" What else was it going to be.*
BUT I DON'T CARE because the characterisation was THE BEST. AND OMG MARTIN FREEMAN. AND OMG BENEDICT CUMBERBATCH (WHAT KIND OF AMAZING NAME IS THAT ANYWAY) EVEN THOUGH I'D NEVER HEARD OF YOU BEFORE.
And now I should go to bed. Probably hopefully signing the contract for the flat tomorrow! If the estate agent calls me.
*Or maybe I am just really clever. Let's go for that. *nod*
So, I was on the Isle of Wight this weekend, and it was very nice and I'll post pictures later, but first:
I saw Sherlock on BBC1 tonight.
FFFFFFFF.
It was SO GOOD. EVEN CAPSLOCK IS INSUFFICIENT TO EXPRESS MY GLEE. SO WELL ADAPTED TO THE PRESENT DAY SETTING. (They use first names all the time, lol.) AND THE WRITING WAS SO GOOD. AND THE ACTING OMG. AND WITH THE TEXT ON THE SCREEN AND STUFF AH I LOVE IT. LOVE IT. I HAVE TO WAIT UNTIL NEXT SUNDAY FOR THE NEXT ONE? T__________T I'm gonna go find my Complete Sherlock Holmes and re-read the first case later.
I did kind of figure out who the killer was before anyone in the show, which was LAME. Maybe it's just because [SPOILER] those "Don't Take Unlicensed Minicabs" ads creep me the fuck out so I'm distrustful of cab drivers. Sorry cab drivers. >_> [/SPOILER] But really, it was kind of obvious, right? "Who do we trust even though we don't know them?" What else was it going to be.*
BUT I DON'T CARE because the characterisation was THE BEST. AND OMG MARTIN FREEMAN. AND OMG BENEDICT CUMBERBATCH (WHAT KIND OF AMAZING NAME IS THAT ANYWAY) EVEN THOUGH I'D NEVER HEARD OF YOU BEFORE.
And now I should go to bed. Probably hopefully signing the contract for the flat tomorrow! If the estate agent calls me.
*Or maybe I am just really clever. Let's go for that. *nod*
Comment, foo! // Comment at LJ
Tags:CAPSLOCK; geeking out; sherlock holmes; tv
Someone on the radio just started talking about their experiences of war. This entire entry feels even more frivolous now. Read on for frivolity.
I am re-reading Cloud Atlas. It's possibly even a little better than I remembered! :D
Also I am super late to the party, but I actually listened to some Lady Gaga songs the other day, and they are pretty good!
Thus concludes the not-quite-as-geeky section of the entry. ONWARDS~
So Saturday Tim and I went to Forbidden Planet and bought POKEMON CARDS. 8D A deck each and some boosters. And now I am really into it again, and I may make an excursion into the attic to see if I can find my old cards. Are they even legal anymore? I really want to build a Ghost/Psychic deck. In some way this is porbably Tumblr's fault for enabling me to look at so much fanart.
Some teenagers on the train on the way back made fun of us. XD Man, teenagers are ridiculous. I am pretty glad I'm not one and can enjoy Pokemon cards with impunity.
I also bought this pretty rockin' t-shirt:
Too bad Uniqlo doesn't have any Gundam t-shirts that look that cool. Don't worry, I still love you Gandamuuu~ ♥I will love you even more when more Unicorn comes out. >_>
And and and I finally found a pre-owned copy of Beautiful Katamari at Game, so that's what I've been doing all weekend. No, really. All weekend. Except I forgot to save yesterday so I had to do everything again. >_> But I got more points and actually managed to do the Mars level without wanting to strangle someone, so woo!
I'm pretty sure Katamari is the best thing the games industry has ever brought forth. Pff, Half Life 2 or WoW or whatever. KATAMARI WINS ALL.
Over all it's been a pretty great weekend.
Only a week and two days until Paris! Paris Paris Paris! I am super excited. Gonna buy so many comic books and do lots of sketching and look at lots of beautiful architecture!
Speaking of architecture, I haven't done much drawing in the last few days, apart from a commission for my mother*, but here is a brush-pen doodle of some houses.
LOL WHAT PERSPECTIVE
There were some really great urban scenes in the exhibition of 20th century Chinese prints at the British Museum, and they've inspired me to try to get better at buildings and so on. Architecture and cities are one of my very favourite things.
Thus concludes the rest of this entry. Do come again.
*I think I'm going to start advertising my services for commissions sometime soon. :O Don't know how that will go, but one or two people — apart form my mother — have asked me, so it's worth a try!
I am re-reading Cloud Atlas. It's possibly even a little better than I remembered! :D
Also I am super late to the party, but I actually listened to some Lady Gaga songs the other day, and they are pretty good!
Thus concludes the not-quite-as-geeky section of the entry. ONWARDS~
So Saturday Tim and I went to Forbidden Planet and bought POKEMON CARDS. 8D A deck each and some boosters. And now I am really into it again, and I may make an excursion into the attic to see if I can find my old cards. Are they even legal anymore? I really want to build a Ghost/Psychic deck. In some way this is porbably Tumblr's fault for enabling me to look at so much fanart.
Some teenagers on the train on the way back made fun of us. XD Man, teenagers are ridiculous. I am pretty glad I'm not one and can enjoy Pokemon cards with impunity.
I also bought this pretty rockin' t-shirt:
Too bad Uniqlo doesn't have any Gundam t-shirts that look that cool. Don't worry, I still love you Gandamuuu~ ♥
And and and I finally found a pre-owned copy of Beautiful Katamari at Game, so that's what I've been doing all weekend. No, really. All weekend. Except I forgot to save yesterday so I had to do everything again. >_> But I got more points and actually managed to do the Mars level without wanting to strangle someone, so woo!
I'm pretty sure Katamari is the best thing the games industry has ever brought forth. Pff, Half Life 2 or WoW or whatever. KATAMARI WINS ALL.
Over all it's been a pretty great weekend.
Only a week and two days until Paris! Paris Paris Paris! I am super excited. Gonna buy so many comic books and do lots of sketching and look at lots of beautiful architecture!
Speaking of architecture, I haven't done much drawing in the last few days, apart from a commission for my mother*, but here is a brush-pen doodle of some houses.
LOL WHAT PERSPECTIVE
There were some really great urban scenes in the exhibition of 20th century Chinese prints at the British Museum, and they've inspired me to try to get better at buildings and so on. Architecture and cities are one of my very favourite things.
Thus concludes the rest of this entry. Do come again.
*I think I'm going to start advertising my services for commissions sometime soon. :O Don't know how that will go, but one or two people — apart form my mother — have asked me, so it's worth a try!
Comment, foo! // Comment at LJ
Tags:Evangelion; games; geeking out; Katamari; loot; Pokemon
I fell asleep just as the children's programming was starting on Radio 7, which is around... 5 am? Wow, later than I thought. And I still woke up at 8:30, feeling perfectly awake. Idek.
I'm trying out a self-motivating tactic where you stop doing something when you're having fun and are still really motivated to keep going, so you'll be quicker to start the next day. It's working so far, but it's really hard! XD I can't stop in the middle of a math problem, it's just not right.
News bulletins:
The Evolution of Palaeolithic and Neolithic Societies in the Near East option at UCL isn't cancelled after all! ♥ You guys can't even believe how thrilled I am about this. It's the perfect module.
Oh, speaking of Archaeology stuff, look, an entire free volume of Human Biology! Which is not what it sounds like but actually (in this case) material form a Center for the Evolution of Cultural Diversity conference on demographics and dispersal and cultural evolution and incredibly sexy things like that. I've only read one article so far, though — I don't really like reading long PDFs on screens where I can't underline stuff and take notes in the margins, but whenever I've been at ACS to make use of their abundance in printer ink and paper the computers have been uncooperative.
I went to see Agora with my parents and Tim last week. It was good! Even better than I expected it to be! A lot deeper than your average period drama, with its depictions of religious conflict and doubt vs. certainty and so on. I really want to see it again to form a more detailed opinion (and because I just want to see it again), but it's only showing in the small cinema at Leicester Square, and the tickets are crazy expensive. Maybe I'll rent the DVD when it comes out.
I think the moral of the story was "science is totally hawt", but that might just have been me.
(You will also notice I am using an APPROPRIATE ASTRONOMY ICON.)
We put in an offer on a flat, but then we decided we couldn't really afford it after all so we had to take the offer back. Still lookin'.
Lastly, there's only 3 episodes of Durarara!! left now, and while I don't want it to end, I am so excited for the last few episodes. There is some kind of epic climax building. Seriously, you guys. Watch it. It's free! Legitimately!
Comment, foo! // Comment at LJ
Tags:Archaeology; Durarararararararararararara; geeking out; life; movies; ucl; uni
I accumulate topics to blog about inbetween posts, each too short for a post of its own—in my opinion, anyway—but I keep collecting them for so long that if I were to write them up all at once they'd end up a hugely long disjointed monstrosity. So I'm gonna write about one or two things now, and some more later.
I took the Political Compass test the other day. Here's my result:
I was kind of surprised how far down it is, since I am, you know, quite a fan of governments existing, in general.
But I wouldn't treat the result as terribly accurate, anyway, because it was such a frustrating test to take. More than half of the questions left me sitting there for ages going "well, I kind of agree with this, but under some circumstances I would definitely disagree, too" or puzzling over semantics. Except for the religion and sex ones. Those were really easy.
Me: "'Today's society is too open about sex'... strongly disagree; we're by far not open enough."
Tim: "I knew you were going to say that, pervert."
I also obviously don't know enough about economics. One of the questions asked whether inflation or unemployment were more important to deal with. I do not know enough about the causes of inflation and unemployment and how they affect each other to answer that. Though apparently it's just code for "do you think rich people's or poor people's problems are more important". Rrrrrgh, simplistic questioning! I'm pretty sure you can't disregard the rich or the poor if you want a healthy economy. Maybe I'll move on to economics when I'm a bit further through the maths section at Khan Academy.
Oh yeah, I've been (re)teaching myself math using the videos at Khan Academy (at the recomendation of... FY!Math, I think, or possibly FY!Space). Because, thanks in part to some of those awesome science panels at Eastercon, I remembered that I've always enjoyed it (despite those IB external assessments. What's the point of a test if they don't tell you what you did wrong afterwards? Bastards), and that I've forgotten rather a lot of it of it. And also it'll be useful for me to know my way around statistics for my MA* (which is the reason that seems to fly best in non-geek circles, but they're all equally legit).
I wasn't sure what I still remembered, so I'm just making my way through it all starting at Algebra, doing a problem or two in each section to make sure I can still solve equations and so on. (I can.)
I've noticed the way I enjoy math is a lot like the way I enjoy language. Okay, the rules of any language probably have a lot more irregularities than math, but they're both structured ways of conveying information. They make sense and are aesthetically pleasing in the same way. Translating something or constructing a sentence feels a lot like a mathematical operation: putting words in the correct order so they transform each other's meaning in the way that will result in the overall intended message. And when you read a sentence you solve it, bit for bit, dividing the words into their types, applying the verbs to the objects and subjects and the adjectives to the nouns, and in the end you have a meaning, which is the solution. I'm sure other people have described this in more eloquent ways, but you know what I mean.
Aside: I never know whether to say "math" or "maths". My spell-check says "maths", but "math" sounds more natural to me. Maybe I'll just start saying "mathematics" all the time.
I didn't intend to divide by fiction/non-fiction, but I guess in my next post I'll talk about what I've been reading and watching lately! \o/
And now I'm gonna go watch the new Star Trek film on blu-ray. Again. :3
*What's that, you say, some understanding of economics will probably also be useful for me academically? Why yes, that is correct. So will linguistics, and a number of other things. Fuck, I love my subject so much.
I took the Political Compass test the other day. Here's my result:
I was kind of surprised how far down it is, since I am, you know, quite a fan of governments existing, in general.
But I wouldn't treat the result as terribly accurate, anyway, because it was such a frustrating test to take. More than half of the questions left me sitting there for ages going "well, I kind of agree with this, but under some circumstances I would definitely disagree, too" or puzzling over semantics. Except for the religion and sex ones. Those were really easy.
Me: "'Today's society is too open about sex'... strongly disagree; we're by far not open enough."
Tim: "I knew you were going to say that, pervert."
I also obviously don't know enough about economics. One of the questions asked whether inflation or unemployment were more important to deal with. I do not know enough about the causes of inflation and unemployment and how they affect each other to answer that. Though apparently it's just code for "do you think rich people's or poor people's problems are more important". Rrrrrgh, simplistic questioning! I'm pretty sure you can't disregard the rich or the poor if you want a healthy economy. Maybe I'll move on to economics when I'm a bit further through the maths section at Khan Academy.
Oh yeah, I've been (re)teaching myself math using the videos at Khan Academy (at the recomendation of... FY!Math, I think, or possibly FY!Space). Because, thanks in part to some of those awesome science panels at Eastercon, I remembered that I've always enjoyed it (despite those IB external assessments. What's the point of a test if they don't tell you what you did wrong afterwards? Bastards), and that I've forgotten rather a lot of it of it. And also it'll be useful for me to know my way around statistics for my MA* (which is the reason that seems to fly best in non-geek circles, but they're all equally legit).
I wasn't sure what I still remembered, so I'm just making my way through it all starting at Algebra, doing a problem or two in each section to make sure I can still solve equations and so on. (I can.)
I've noticed the way I enjoy math is a lot like the way I enjoy language. Okay, the rules of any language probably have a lot more irregularities than math, but they're both structured ways of conveying information. They make sense and are aesthetically pleasing in the same way. Translating something or constructing a sentence feels a lot like a mathematical operation: putting words in the correct order so they transform each other's meaning in the way that will result in the overall intended message. And when you read a sentence you solve it, bit for bit, dividing the words into their types, applying the verbs to the objects and subjects and the adjectives to the nouns, and in the end you have a meaning, which is the solution. I'm sure other people have described this in more eloquent ways, but you know what I mean.
Aside: I never know whether to say "math" or "maths". My spell-check says "maths", but "math" sounds more natural to me. Maybe I'll just start saying "mathematics" all the time.
I didn't intend to divide by fiction/non-fiction, but I guess in my next post I'll talk about what I've been reading and watching lately! \o/
And now I'm gonna go watch the new Star Trek film on blu-ray. Again. :3
*What's that, you say, some understanding of economics will probably also be useful for me academically? Why yes, that is correct. So will linguistics, and a number of other things. Fuck, I love my subject so much.
Comment, foo! // Comment at LJ
Tags:geeking out; languages; mathematics; politics
Why am I incapable of not taking notes or doodling? And why did I say I would scan them all? (I don't mind, really.) Anyway.
I totally uploaded all my notes onto my website and formatted this post nicely with thumbnails, and then I remembered I have a flickr account, where people can click 'next' and 'previous' and other useful things like that. Click on the link for each day to get the beginning of my notes form it in the flickr set.
Friday: I went to the Time Travel & Alternative History talk, which was pretty good — picked up lots of book recs.
The highlight of the day was a talk titled "Homer's Odyssey - The World's First Fantasy Novel". It was less about fantasy novels and more a quick run-through of the themes of the Odyssey (quite a few of which are shared by fantasy novels), and it made me want to read it so bad. I mean, it was on my list vaguely, anyway, but now it's moved a lot closer to the top.
Then a talk on allergies, the first of many interesting science talks (I haven't counted, but I think I might've gone to more science talks than actual SF and fantasy ones), one on Arthurian legends, and a Writing Video Games panel that didn't mention any games I didn't already know, but made me iritated at myself for not playing those games. Also panels on gender and alternative sexuality in SF, which were pretty good but not as cool as they could've been, I think.
Saturday: Highlights... Saturday was sort of all highlights. I really wanted to go to the talk on whether immortality is a good thing in the morning, but my hotel bed was really warm and comfortable, ok? Anyway, I started my day with "Quantum Computing for Beginners", which was super interesting, but so packed with people that I could only see the top three lines of every slide form where I was sitting. D: I wanted to copy the diagrams! (As a slightly related aside, I am getting increasingly fond of mathematics, even though I've forgotten everything I learned in IB Maths. I have some websites bookmarked that will hopefully remedy that.)
Then I went to Ben Goldacre's talk, which was super fun and full of swearing, and should probably have been twice as long. And now he is even more one of my favourite people. *fangirl*
I also made a Dalek cake with![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif)
lullula and her mum. IS IT NOT A THING OF BEAUTY? The Victorian Self-Defense talk/demonstration was lots of fun, watching the Dr Who special as part of a massive audience was a pretty amazing experience, "Non-Euclidean Geometry" was excellent (again with the maths), basically, the whole day was excellent. Oh, except for the the previously mentioned slash panel, which was better than I expected it to be in some ways, but bad in different and exciting ways. BUT at least I met some cool people through that. :3 Ah, I really want to stay in the con hotel next time I go to one, so I can stay up as late as I want talking to people and then just collapse into bed.
Sunday: Sunday was a little empty, but the Big Biology talk was very cool, and I learned how to knit socks! Though I foresee myself not doing much knitting in my daily life, if I'm honest. I could do it while watching TV, but I draw when I watch TV! It's just not gonna work out. I also sort of forgot to eat lunch and dinner that day, which put me in a really bad mood towards the evening.
Monday: Things that were supercool on Monday: basically everything. Lots of interesting discussions, despite the fact that I was pretty exhausted by that time. "Novels: A Product Their Time?" (historiography! Except with novels. Er... literarography. Literary analysis? It was very good, anyway), Researching Fantasy (I love worldbuilding) and Alien Invasions (colonial analogues!), especially. Also The Eastercon version of Just A Minute was brilliant.
I really wanted to mention "An Almanac for the Alien Invaders" in the Alien Invasions talk, but I was just too slow and the conversation'd moved on. But I will recommend it to you now! It's one of my favourite Escape Pod stories, and not just because it has archaeologists in it. (Though I admit that is a part of it. Hey, it addresses issues that interest me, but with aliens - what else is science fiction for? Besides badass space explosions, I mean.)
I also came home with a lot of books, considering my strained finances. There's the usual freebies, which... I will probably... read eventually? Last years are still sitting in my shelf, too. ¬_¬
I also got Redclaw by Philip Palmer, which I was immediately attracted to because the beginning of the blurb made me thing of Archaeology (it's about some researchers who have to record and entire alien ecosystem before it's destroyed to make the planet fit for human habitation), and The Mammoth Book of Alternate Histories, because alt history is well known to be for cool kids. I was agonising about which of them to buy, andlullula took them both off me and bought them for me as a belated birthday present, making her my favourite person for the day.
I bought Fun With Rainbows a collection of short, concepty stories by Gareth Owens, basically on the basis of it having a nice cover and interestingly-titled stories. It's pretty good. In one or two of the stories the timing seemed a bit off — in "Tempus Fugit" I figured out what was going on before the narrator did, for example — but most of them are pretty delightful, and the creepy ones are really creepy. Especially the one with the eyes, oh man.
I also got this incredibly beautiful thing, which was meant to be £30, but I went back for it half an hour before the Dealers' Room was set to close on the last day, and convinced the dealer to give it to me for £10. Pretty much my proudest achievement of the weekend. And at the same time I picked up a bunch of free/super-cheap volumes of SF short story magazines. The moral of the story: Go to the Dealers' Room as late as you can and you will get stuff fer cheap.
Oh, andlullula also lent me Mr Dacy, Vampire. Pride & Prejudice & Zombies was pretty disappointing, let's see if this one's better.
I totally uploaded all my notes onto my website and formatted this post nicely with thumbnails, and then I remembered I have a flickr account, where people can click 'next' and 'previous' and other useful things like that. Click on the link for each day to get the beginning of my notes form it in the flickr set.
Friday: I went to the Time Travel & Alternative History talk, which was pretty good — picked up lots of book recs.
The highlight of the day was a talk titled "Homer's Odyssey - The World's First Fantasy Novel". It was less about fantasy novels and more a quick run-through of the themes of the Odyssey (quite a few of which are shared by fantasy novels), and it made me want to read it so bad. I mean, it was on my list vaguely, anyway, but now it's moved a lot closer to the top.
Then a talk on allergies, the first of many interesting science talks (I haven't counted, but I think I might've gone to more science talks than actual SF and fantasy ones), one on Arthurian legends, and a Writing Video Games panel that didn't mention any games I didn't already know, but made me iritated at myself for not playing those games. Also panels on gender and alternative sexuality in SF, which were pretty good but not as cool as they could've been, I think.
Saturday: Highlights... Saturday was sort of all highlights. I really wanted to go to the talk on whether immortality is a good thing in the morning, but my hotel bed was really warm and comfortable, ok? Anyway, I started my day with "Quantum Computing for Beginners", which was super interesting, but so packed with people that I could only see the top three lines of every slide form where I was sitting. D: I wanted to copy the diagrams! (As a slightly related aside, I am getting increasingly fond of mathematics, even though I've forgotten everything I learned in IB Maths. I have some websites bookmarked that will hopefully remedy that.)
Then I went to Ben Goldacre's talk, which was super fun and full of swearing, and should probably have been twice as long. And now he is even more one of my favourite people. *fangirl*
I also made a Dalek cake with
lullula and her mum. IS IT NOT A THING OF BEAUTY? The Victorian Self-Defense talk/demonstration was lots of fun, watching the Dr Who special as part of a massive audience was a pretty amazing experience, "Non-Euclidean Geometry" was excellent (again with the maths), basically, the whole day was excellent. Oh, except for the the previously mentioned slash panel, which was better than I expected it to be in some ways, but bad in different and exciting ways. BUT at least I met some cool people through that. :3 Ah, I really want to stay in the con hotel next time I go to one, so I can stay up as late as I want talking to people and then just collapse into bed.Sunday: Sunday was a little empty, but the Big Biology talk was very cool, and I learned how to knit socks! Though I foresee myself not doing much knitting in my daily life, if I'm honest. I could do it while watching TV, but I draw when I watch TV! It's just not gonna work out. I also sort of forgot to eat lunch and dinner that day, which put me in a really bad mood towards the evening.
Monday: Things that were supercool on Monday: basically everything. Lots of interesting discussions, despite the fact that I was pretty exhausted by that time. "Novels: A Product Their Time?" (historiography! Except with novels. Er... literarography. Literary analysis? It was very good, anyway), Researching Fantasy (I love worldbuilding) and Alien Invasions (colonial analogues!), especially. Also The Eastercon version of Just A Minute was brilliant.
I really wanted to mention "An Almanac for the Alien Invaders" in the Alien Invasions talk, but I was just too slow and the conversation'd moved on. But I will recommend it to you now! It's one of my favourite Escape Pod stories, and not just because it has archaeologists in it. (Though I admit that is a part of it. Hey, it addresses issues that interest me, but with aliens - what else is science fiction for? Besides badass space explosions, I mean.)
I also came home with a lot of books, considering my strained finances. There's the usual freebies, which... I will probably... read eventually? Last years are still sitting in my shelf, too. ¬_¬
I also got Redclaw by Philip Palmer, which I was immediately attracted to because the beginning of the blurb made me thing of Archaeology (it's about some researchers who have to record and entire alien ecosystem before it's destroyed to make the planet fit for human habitation), and The Mammoth Book of Alternate Histories, because alt history is well known to be for cool kids. I was agonising about which of them to buy, and
lullula took them both off me and bought them for me as a belated birthday present, making her my favourite person for the day. I bought Fun With Rainbows a collection of short, concepty stories by Gareth Owens, basically on the basis of it having a nice cover and interestingly-titled stories. It's pretty good. In one or two of the stories the timing seemed a bit off — in "Tempus Fugit" I figured out what was going on before the narrator did, for example — but most of them are pretty delightful, and the creepy ones are really creepy. Especially the one with the eyes, oh man.
I also got this incredibly beautiful thing, which was meant to be £30, but I went back for it half an hour before the Dealers' Room was set to close on the last day, and convinced the dealer to give it to me for £10. Pretty much my proudest achievement of the weekend. And at the same time I picked up a bunch of free/super-cheap volumes of SF short story magazines. The moral of the story: Go to the Dealers' Room as late as you can and you will get stuff fer cheap.
Oh, and
lullula also lent me Mr Dacy, Vampire. Pride & Prejudice & Zombies was pretty disappointing, let's see if this one's better.
2 Comments // Comment at LJ
Tags:Eastercon; fantasy; geeking out; I like books they are my friends; long post is long; sci-fi
If anyone tries to tell you that I was actively looking forward to the day I could attempt to translate "The Spice must flow" into Japanese, they would be lying.
I actively look forward to the day I can translate "The Spice must flow" into Arabic.
I was going to go to this to-day, but it turns out it's one of those exhibitions you have to order tickets in advance for, and they're fully booked until later this week. Maybe I can drag someone along on the weekend.
I still want to go out somewhere, though... guess I should save my train money. :<
Comment, foo! // Comment at LJ
Tags:geeking out; languages; 日本語
A few days ago, I came across the concept of mathematical beauty. I'd never heard of it before, and I'm not a mathematician, but it makes complete and perfect sense to me.
I think the same concept should exist for languages; I definitely experience linguistic beauty all the time.
I don't mean words that sounds beautiful or expresses beautiful things, though obviously that exists as well, but just a satisfaction and pleasure derived from the structure of language, and how it works and fits together and makes sense.
Granted, I'm sure a part of my enjoyment of languages comes from the sense of achievement; because they're challenging, but not frustratingly so. But apart from that, languages have a beauty in themselves, in my opinion. Figuring out what an English word means because I sort of know the Latin prefix and a French word that sounds a little like it is satisfying, but the patterns (for lack of a better word) made by the European languages and their incestuous evolution are beautiful in their own right.*
I'm really enjoying Japanese grammar. It's strange and different from what I'm used to, and parts of it are really beautifully elegant. Tim was over at my house the other day when I was reading about qualifying nouns with verbs (I love that. I want to do it all the time), and I tried to explain to him why I found it so pleasing, but it completely didn't work. I think it's one of the things you either get or you don't.
I'm going to have so much fun immersing myself in learning this language in the next year.
*Have I mentioned how much I want to take this course if I get into UCL? I WANT TO TAKE THAT COURSE SO HARD. My ALLCAPS are italicised, that's how hard I want that course.
I think the same concept should exist for languages; I definitely experience linguistic beauty all the time.
I don't mean words that sounds beautiful or expresses beautiful things, though obviously that exists as well, but just a satisfaction and pleasure derived from the structure of language, and how it works and fits together and makes sense.
Granted, I'm sure a part of my enjoyment of languages comes from the sense of achievement; because they're challenging, but not frustratingly so. But apart from that, languages have a beauty in themselves, in my opinion. Figuring out what an English word means because I sort of know the Latin prefix and a French word that sounds a little like it is satisfying, but the patterns (for lack of a better word) made by the European languages and their incestuous evolution are beautiful in their own right.*
I'm really enjoying Japanese grammar. It's strange and different from what I'm used to, and parts of it are really beautifully elegant. Tim was over at my house the other day when I was reading about qualifying nouns with verbs (I love that. I want to do it all the time), and I tried to explain to him why I found it so pleasing, but it completely didn't work. I think it's one of the things you either get or you don't.
I'm going to have so much fun immersing myself in learning this language in the next year.
*Have I mentioned how much I want to take this course if I get into UCL? I WANT TO TAKE THAT COURSE SO HARD. My ALLCAPS are italicised, that's how hard I want that course.
Comment, foo! // Comment at LJ
Tags:geeking out; languages; 日本語
Oh god, it's so hot and humid. D: It's half past midnight, and the internet says it's 21°. That is not a midnight temperature for Durham. There was a huge rainstorm to-day and it's already as humid as it was before. The only air-conditioned place I have been all day is the Archaeology department building. I think I'll move there for the next few days.
Anyway. It's been a long day. We're back in college for the last few days, and some drunk arseholes opened my door at 3am this morning, because they were drunk, and idiots, and I didn't lock my door. When you are half asleep at 3am, realising that some drunk arseholes have just been in your room is pretty fucking creepy, and you may have to get up sleepily to make sure none of them are hiding in your closet and then lie awake for a while.
I dislike people.
I think a small insect just flew up my nose.
Anyway. I read this really interesting article this morning: Bateman's principles and human sex roles . I was actually looking for the one that this is based on, but I came across the other one first, and I obviously cannot resist an article with "sex" in the title. Don't be ridiculous.
I was going to tell you about it, actually, because it is, truly, very interesting, but a day of meltiiiiiing has left me way too sleepy to bother. In summary, if I remember correctly: mating strategy is based on how often you are likely to meet mates, how much effort it takes to find them, how much effort it takes to court/mate/raise offspring, and... how much the quality of mates varies from individual to individual. I think I've got that right. Basically: males are not always promiscuous and females are not always choosy, because that is a stupid idea and you should feel stupid.
Also: humans' mating strategies are not like fruit flies'. Shocker of the century. They also vary based on culture. ALSO SHOCKER OF THE CENTURY. Ok, I admit I have a bit of a bias towards culture in things like this. *social scientist* I mean, I don't think culture completely overrides biology, that would also be a stupid idea. Obviously culture builds on biology and the environment, but I find it headdeskingly ridiculous when people completely deny the existance of culture, or the fact that it affects the environment and biology in return. Co-evolution.
There was an anthropologist at the Dawson Building conference who had a diagram in his presentation that looked like this:
And while I'm obviously not as learne'd as a professor of anthropology, I think it should really be drawn like this:
Maybe Behaviour & Action should have an arrow going to Mind or Culture, as well? Also yeah, I did these in Word. I haven't got my tablet OR a mouse hooked up at the moment.
Especially after reading the article in New Scientist about the nocebo effect a while ago, and the chapter in Bad Science on placebos. These things have effects in your body, producing physical chemicals and causing reactions just because of their cultural meaning. And I think the journal article said something, as well, about culturally-affected mating strategies changing genes in communities. Or something like that. Tell me that does not indicate the influence goes both ways.
Wait until I get my cybernetic implants, is all I'm saying.
Alright, so I guess I wasn't too sleepy to bother after all. I was hoping to mention all that in a more well-thought-out and structured entry, but with the way life is at the moment it would probably not really have happened for ages.
In slightly related news, I went to one of Durham's a million and two mobile phone shops to-day because I saw the HTC Magic in their window and wanted to play with the Android operating system, and now... I own it. XD
I kept my old number (I'm going to keep this number FOREVER, srsly. This is the fourth phone I've had it on now, I think), so I have to wait a few days until the SIM card is activated and I can use the internet features and download a ton of cool apps, but it's already pretty awesome.
Also I'm on Vodafone so no roaming fees for me on the hiking trip. \o/
And now I'm going to bed.
Anyway. It's been a long day. We're back in college for the last few days, and some drunk arseholes opened my door at 3am this morning, because they were drunk, and idiots, and I didn't lock my door. When you are half asleep at 3am, realising that some drunk arseholes have just been in your room is pretty fucking creepy, and you may have to get up sleepily to make sure none of them are hiding in your closet and then lie awake for a while.
I dislike people.
I think a small insect just flew up my nose.
Anyway. I read this really interesting article this morning: Bateman's principles and human sex roles . I was actually looking for the one that this is based on, but I came across the other one first, and I obviously cannot resist an article with "sex" in the title. Don't be ridiculous.
I was going to tell you about it, actually, because it is, truly, very interesting, but a day of meltiiiiiing has left me way too sleepy to bother. In summary, if I remember correctly: mating strategy is based on how often you are likely to meet mates, how much effort it takes to find them, how much effort it takes to court/mate/raise offspring, and... how much the quality of mates varies from individual to individual. I think I've got that right. Basically: males are not always promiscuous and females are not always choosy, because that is a stupid idea and you should feel stupid.
Also: humans' mating strategies are not like fruit flies'. Shocker of the century. They also vary based on culture. ALSO SHOCKER OF THE CENTURY. Ok, I admit I have a bit of a bias towards culture in things like this. *social scientist* I mean, I don't think culture completely overrides biology, that would also be a stupid idea. Obviously culture builds on biology and the environment, but I find it headdeskingly ridiculous when people completely deny the existance of culture, or the fact that it affects the environment and biology in return. Co-evolution.
There was an anthropologist at the Dawson Building conference who had a diagram in his presentation that looked like this:
And while I'm obviously not as learne'd as a professor of anthropology, I think it should really be drawn like this:
Maybe Behaviour & Action should have an arrow going to Mind or Culture, as well? Also yeah, I did these in Word. I haven't got my tablet OR a mouse hooked up at the moment.
Especially after reading the article in New Scientist about the nocebo effect a while ago, and the chapter in Bad Science on placebos. These things have effects in your body, producing physical chemicals and causing reactions just because of their cultural meaning. And I think the journal article said something, as well, about culturally-affected mating strategies changing genes in communities. Or something like that. Tell me that does not indicate the influence goes both ways.
Wait until I get my cybernetic implants, is all I'm saying.
Alright, so I guess I wasn't too sleepy to bother after all. I was hoping to mention all that in a more well-thought-out and structured entry, but with the way life is at the moment it would probably not really have happened for ages.
In slightly related news, I went to one of Durham's a million and two mobile phone shops to-day because I saw the HTC Magic in their window and wanted to play with the Android operating system, and now... I own it. XD
I kept my old number (I'm going to keep this number FOREVER, srsly. This is the fourth phone I've had it on now, I think), so I have to wait a few days until the SIM card is activated and I can use the internet features and download a ton of cool apps, but it's already pretty awesome.
Also I'm on Vodafone so no roaming fees for me on the hiking trip. \o/
And now I'm going to bed.
Comment, foo! // Comment at LJ
Tags:awesome technology stuff; Durham; geeking out; humans suck; I am right and you are wrong; life; science is my favourite rock band; weather
Aw, look at how empty the calendar for this month is; I fail at blogging. Anyway.
Before I write about anything else, my BFFsnow_vs_asphalt twit'd this while I was gone:
I love what this says about both of us.
Sososososo, EASTERCON. I guess I'll tell you about it day by day...
Friday
On Friday I mainly sat on trains. XD Because I have very little trust in rail-replacement bus services, I left massively early, and ended up having to wait at King's Cross for almost two hours, but eh, it wasn't too bad. Read a bit, listened to podcasts, ate sandwiches, sketched people standing in line without them noticing me, fun times. Spent the rest of the journey watching BSG eps on my Zune (they were right, it does get better).
I went to a few things when I got there. The pre-game meeting for the Kunji Revoltt(he LARP - I almost started to dissuade myself from going, because I'm a shy self-hindering lame-o sometimes, but I stfu'd and got on with it, since I'mnot a teenager anymore just awesome like that), and then had in character lunch... dinner... dunch at 6 with the other members of the Royal Society.
Then I went to a panel on Bad Biology, which ended up being more cool speculative Biology (migrating forests!) than bad, but nonetheless win. Wish I'd taken more notes there. Then one on "Researching Your World" which ended up being mostly on near future type stuff (Charles Stross was on the panel, so), and the effects of technology on society, as well as a little general advice on researching worlds. One of the best of the whole con, I think. I really liked all the people on it; gonna check out their work. There was a Kunji event, and after that a panel on "Classics that Aren't" - things that are considered classics that shouldn't be & such. A little over my head since I haven't actually read that much classic sci-fi, and towards the end it degenerated into some guy (who's probably important or famous in some way) raging against fantasy novels in general. >_<
Saturday
Some pretty good stuff on Saturday. Mostly on at the same times as other stuff.
A few Kenji things and then the first panel I went to was "Maqpping the mysterious" about designing worlds in a map-making sense. I wish there'd been more of it, it didn't go on at all long enough! And half of it ended up being on whether maps should be included in books. Apparently they're very expensive to put in.
After that a "Starting with Comics" panel cum recommending session to get into comics, which was awesome, and resulted in the majority of this. (Feel free to recommend me more if you know any, btw. I'll buy them all eventually.)
The next panel was the best of the day, I think. Missed the Easter Doctor Who special for it! XD Not that it was what I expected it to be. It was called "Dealing with Dead Meat", about "how dead bodies really are", so I expected a lot of, I dunno, decomposition and stuff. Well, alright, there was that, too. Anyway, what it was was a doctor and a mortician telling their funny, disturbing, and sobering stories. it was amazing.
And then there was "Bad Sex in SF". Oh, the lulz. And they quoted this, which is my favourite passage of bad prose in the world.
The one talk I was a little disappointed by was one titled "Space Ain't What We Thought It Would Be", which was basically a run-down of the space missions of the last few decades. Which was interesting, but I pretty much knew all of it already. :/
Sunday
Sunday was probably the busiest day. The first thing I went to was "How Movies & TV get their Martial Arts wrong (on purpose)". I haven't see many martial arts films, tbh, but it's always fun seeing people throw other people around. Especially when the person doing the throwing is in a wheelchair! I was seriously impressed. Want to see that in a martial arts movie.
The next panel was a prettyt easy choice. I mean, it was titled "They Keep Killing Hitler". How could I resist. Got a lot of recs for alternative history novels from that. The next one was a presentation by a folklorist about Spring-Helled Jack, who/which I'd never heard of before, but it was interesting to see how rumours and urban legends get started and propagated.
The next was "A Little Learning is a Dangerous Thing", about references in novels and whether it's possible to enjoy them without getting them. The Discworld books are an extreme example, obviously, but did you know there's obscure medievalist word-usage in-jokes in Lord of the Rings? Apparently so. Also, apart from anything else, my notes from this panel have the best doodles of the weekend:
And then I went to an introductory talk on Quantum Mechanics, which was awesome. The woman who gave it was brilliant at explaining. Such fascinating sutff. <3
Afterwards there was a panel on "The SF-savvy Criminal", which continued to get derailed into the ethics of surveillance cameras and so on, and then there was the book launch and signing for The Third God, the last volume of one of my favourite book series, which I have been waiting for for quite literally years.
Apparently, according to his talk, Ricardo Pinto realised while writing this volume that it was actually all a big autobiographical therapeutic exercise. I think I'll continue to enjoy it for the complex and dark world, though. The man is a genius at world-building. (Or, you know, obsessive, with the plasticine models and shadow-angle calculations. But I think that's really cool.)
After that I went to a what-if-famous-novels-were-RPG-campaigns panel, which was really funny, but also, um, a bit over my head, seeing as I've never actually done any roleplaying, though I really want to try. I started feeling a little noobish and out-geeked, by the end. >_> Must remember it's not a competition and I have nothing to prove...
Then after the last Kunji event (which was a little disorganised, but we did kill a werewolf), the same woman who did the Quantum talk gave a Brief History of the Universe talk, and then I took the bus back to the hotel, and packed while watching red Dwarf on Dave.
Monday
Just four panels on Monday, before the end, and another two hour wait in a train station, because pff, timing, who needs timing when you can have cheap, late train tickets.
The first was "World Building with Music", which had a lot about classical music and it's narrative structure. Then another recommendations for comic-n00bs panel (this time "for the discerning SF fan") where I won a Hellblazer comic in a raffle. :D
And then "Terraforming vs Pantropy" which was another of the highlights of the con. (Pantropy, btw, is genetically engerneering humans to match other planets instead of the other way around. New favourite word!) A lot of speculation about generation ships and artificial wombs and colonies on Mars, as well as some more book recs.
And then another Physics talk. "Beginner's time travel", light clocks and worm-holes and paradoxes with billiard balls.
Your useless fact of the day ration: astronauts are on average 10μs younger than they would be if they'd never gone to space at high speeds.
All in all, I really really enjoyed it. I'm glad I went to the LARP, though it was a tiny bit disorganised, and maybe just not suited to a con setting, it was a good way to start talking to people... even if it was about selling the treatment that'd allowed Queen Victoria to live until 2009 to alien kings. Even without that, though, I loved the whole atmosphere of being able to turn to anyone sitting next to you and have a friendly conversation. I dunno, maybe incredibly socially capable people feel like that all the time, but it was pretty novel to me. I'm going to try to carry over that confidence to normal life. Though when I said something to people on the next bench over while waiting for the train, they looked a bit bemused. XD
Oh, also, click here for a txt file of all the book and comic recs I got from panels and such.
In other news, I went shopping with my mum a few days ago, and got some pimpin' new shoes (my other ones aren't really suited for warm weather):
Also a cool new top. Also a sweat-dress type thing, which I can't find on the website. And some new bras. Yay, bras. :D
Anyways, the train to Durham leaves at 10 tonight (again with the late cheap trains ftw), so I'd better get back to packing.
Before I write about anything else, my BFF
snow_vs_asphalt twit'd this while I was gone:I love what this says about both of us.
Sososososo, EASTERCON. I guess I'll tell you about it day by day...
Friday
On Friday I mainly sat on trains. XD Because I have very little trust in rail-replacement bus services, I left massively early, and ended up having to wait at King's Cross for almost two hours, but eh, it wasn't too bad. Read a bit, listened to podcasts, ate sandwiches, sketched people standing in line without them noticing me, fun times. Spent the rest of the journey watching BSG eps on my Zune (they were right, it does get better).
I went to a few things when I got there. The pre-game meeting for the Kunji Revoltt(he LARP - I almost started to dissuade myself from going, because I'm a shy self-hindering lame-o sometimes, but I stfu'd and got on with it, since I'm
Then I went to a panel on Bad Biology, which ended up being more cool speculative Biology (migrating forests!) than bad, but nonetheless win. Wish I'd taken more notes there. Then one on "Researching Your World" which ended up being mostly on near future type stuff (Charles Stross was on the panel, so), and the effects of technology on society, as well as a little general advice on researching worlds. One of the best of the whole con, I think. I really liked all the people on it; gonna check out their work. There was a Kunji event, and after that a panel on "Classics that Aren't" - things that are considered classics that shouldn't be & such. A little over my head since I haven't actually read that much classic sci-fi, and towards the end it degenerated into some guy (who's probably important or famous in some way) raging against fantasy novels in general. >_<
Saturday
Some pretty good stuff on Saturday. Mostly on at the same times as other stuff.
A few Kenji things and then the first panel I went to was "Maqpping the mysterious" about designing worlds in a map-making sense. I wish there'd been more of it, it didn't go on at all long enough! And half of it ended up being on whether maps should be included in books. Apparently they're very expensive to put in.
After that a "Starting with Comics" panel cum recommending session to get into comics, which was awesome, and resulted in the majority of this. (Feel free to recommend me more if you know any, btw. I'll buy them all eventually.)
The next panel was the best of the day, I think. Missed the Easter Doctor Who special for it! XD Not that it was what I expected it to be. It was called "Dealing with Dead Meat", about "how dead bodies really are", so I expected a lot of, I dunno, decomposition and stuff. Well, alright, there was that, too. Anyway, what it was was a doctor and a mortician telling their funny, disturbing, and sobering stories. it was amazing.
And then there was "Bad Sex in SF". Oh, the lulz. And they quoted this, which is my favourite passage of bad prose in the world.
The one talk I was a little disappointed by was one titled "Space Ain't What We Thought It Would Be", which was basically a run-down of the space missions of the last few decades. Which was interesting, but I pretty much knew all of it already. :/
Sunday
Sunday was probably the busiest day. The first thing I went to was "How Movies & TV get their Martial Arts wrong (on purpose)". I haven't see many martial arts films, tbh, but it's always fun seeing people throw other people around. Especially when the person doing the throwing is in a wheelchair! I was seriously impressed. Want to see that in a martial arts movie.
The next panel was a prettyt easy choice. I mean, it was titled "They Keep Killing Hitler". How could I resist. Got a lot of recs for alternative history novels from that. The next one was a presentation by a folklorist about Spring-Helled Jack, who/which I'd never heard of before, but it was interesting to see how rumours and urban legends get started and propagated.
The next was "A Little Learning is a Dangerous Thing", about references in novels and whether it's possible to enjoy them without getting them. The Discworld books are an extreme example, obviously, but did you know there's obscure medievalist word-usage in-jokes in Lord of the Rings? Apparently so. Also, apart from anything else, my notes from this panel have the best doodles of the weekend:
And then I went to an introductory talk on Quantum Mechanics, which was awesome. The woman who gave it was brilliant at explaining. Such fascinating sutff. <3
Afterwards there was a panel on "The SF-savvy Criminal", which continued to get derailed into the ethics of surveillance cameras and so on, and then there was the book launch and signing for The Third God, the last volume of one of my favourite book series, which I have been waiting for for quite literally years.
Apparently, according to his talk, Ricardo Pinto realised while writing this volume that it was actually all a big autobiographical therapeutic exercise. I think I'll continue to enjoy it for the complex and dark world, though. The man is a genius at world-building. (Or, you know, obsessive, with the plasticine models and shadow-angle calculations. But I think that's really cool.)
After that I went to a what-if-famous-novels-were-RPG-campaigns panel, which was really funny, but also, um, a bit over my head, seeing as I've never actually done any roleplaying, though I really want to try. I started feeling a little noobish and out-geeked, by the end. >_> Must remember it's not a competition and I have nothing to prove...
Then after the last Kunji event (which was a little disorganised, but we did kill a werewolf), the same woman who did the Quantum talk gave a Brief History of the Universe talk, and then I took the bus back to the hotel, and packed while watching red Dwarf on Dave.
Monday
Just four panels on Monday, before the end, and another two hour wait in a train station, because pff, timing, who needs timing when you can have cheap, late train tickets.
The first was "World Building with Music", which had a lot about classical music and it's narrative structure. Then another recommendations for comic-n00bs panel (this time "for the discerning SF fan") where I won a Hellblazer comic in a raffle. :D
And then "Terraforming vs Pantropy" which was another of the highlights of the con. (Pantropy, btw, is genetically engerneering humans to match other planets instead of the other way around. New favourite word!) A lot of speculation about generation ships and artificial wombs and colonies on Mars, as well as some more book recs.
And then another Physics talk. "Beginner's time travel", light clocks and worm-holes and paradoxes with billiard balls.
Your useless fact of the day ration: astronauts are on average 10μs younger than they would be if they'd never gone to space at high speeds.
All in all, I really really enjoyed it. I'm glad I went to the LARP, though it was a tiny bit disorganised, and maybe just not suited to a con setting, it was a good way to start talking to people... even if it was about selling the treatment that'd allowed Queen Victoria to live until 2009 to alien kings. Even without that, though, I loved the whole atmosphere of being able to turn to anyone sitting next to you and have a friendly conversation. I dunno, maybe incredibly socially capable people feel like that all the time, but it was pretty novel to me. I'm going to try to carry over that confidence to normal life. Though when I said something to people on the next bench over while waiting for the train, they looked a bit bemused. XD
Oh, also, click here for a txt file of all the book and comic recs I got from panels and such.
In other news, I went shopping with my mum a few days ago, and got some pimpin' new shoes (my other ones aren't really suited for warm weather):
Also a cool new top. Also a sweat-dress type thing, which I can't find on the website. And some new bras. Yay, bras. :D
Anyways, the train to Durham leaves at 10 tonight (again with the late cheap trains ftw), so I'd better get back to packing.
Comment, foo! // Comment at LJ
Tags:awesome; Eastercon; geeking out; I like books they are my friends; life; loot; shopping
So I may or may not now have Celestial Being's logo emblem as the background on my phone.
Well, you know, this break I decided, after some introspection, that I was going to stop being vaguely embarrassed about the things I like just because some hypothetical They on the internet might assume I only like them to impress my boyfriend or for the pretty androgynous robot-people or something. I mean, you can't sustainably tone down your enthusiasm AND feel the need to assert and prove your geek-cred at every turn.*
And if I am going to geek around openly like that, I might as well pretend my phone is Celestial-Being-issue and I might get a call AT ANY MOMENT.
:3
WHY AM I EVEN AWAKE AT THIS HOUR; BEDTIME.
PS: did I tell you I got a Haro phone-strap in London? My entire phone is Gundam-themed. :D A small part of my life will now revolve around leaving it out on the table during lectures and hoping someone will recognise and mention it.
*(I'm also going to make an effort to watch BSG and some other stuff that Tim has not introduced me to so I don't drown in anime and feel like an easily-influenced loser. It's not my fault he spends HIS LIFE watching this stuff and so has a million cool things to show me all the time. Also until I excise the teenage impulse to define my self-worth in this way, try not to forget about the large amount of geek-cred I get for the INCREDIBLY COOL SCI-FI AND OBSCURE FANTASY NOVELS I spend half my life reading. Fr srs.)
Well, you know, this break I decided, after some introspection, that I was going to stop being vaguely embarrassed about the things I like just because some hypothetical They on the internet might assume I only like them to impress my boyfriend or for the pretty androgynous robot-people or something. I mean, you can't sustainably tone down your enthusiasm AND feel the need to assert and prove your geek-cred at every turn.*
And if I am going to geek around openly like that, I might as well pretend my phone is Celestial-Being-issue and I might get a call AT ANY MOMENT.
:3
WHY AM I EVEN AWAKE AT THIS HOUR; BEDTIME.
PS: did I tell you I got a Haro phone-strap in London? My entire phone is Gundam-themed. :D A small part of my life will now revolve around leaving it out on the table during lectures and hoping someone will recognise and mention it.
*(I'm also going to make an effort to watch BSG and some other stuff that Tim has not introduced me to so I don't drown in anime and feel like an easily-influenced loser. It's not my fault he spends HIS LIFE watching this stuff and so has a million cool things to show me all the time. Also until I excise the teenage impulse to define my self-worth in this way, try not to forget about the large amount of geek-cred I get for the INCREDIBLY COOL SCI-FI AND OBSCURE FANTASY NOVELS I spend half my life reading. Fr srs.)
Comment, foo! // Comment at LJ
Tags:ahaha I have issues; GANDAMUUU; geeking out