Selkie

Cranky bastards and forum misanthropes, does the sound of Christmas carols fill you with nausea and uncontrollable rage? Rejoice! I have recently been made aware of this most excellent antidote to the forced cheeriness of gold-hued Victoriana:

A Very Scary Solstice

What a terrific way to remind the little ones that Cthulhu is the reason for the season. Demonstrate your allegiance to the Old Ones by playing this music loudly and publicly, and perhaps you will be rewarded by being eaten first.

A lot's going to depend on the definition of "family-oriented corporation", but based on those I've worked for or heard about which identify themselves as such:

* People without children are often required to bear additional workload to compensate for the flex time and other perks often granted to parents. It's not at all uncommon for single employees to, in effect, subsidize the parents' insurance costs too. Great for parents, lousy for everyone else.

* Many "family-oriented" companies allow, even encourage, parents of small children to bring them to the office, either occasionally or regularly. Productivity takes a nosedive in almost all of those situations, because parents are distracted by their children, the children find their own amusement and disrupt other employees, etc.

* There's often a subtle loss of privacy, as "family-oriented companies" encourage people to share details of their home and family lives that in other, less personal environments, would be kept private.

Welcome, AP.  It's especially good to have a Hoosier here.  I wondered when/if one would show up? One side of my family is from there, as are both sides of my girlfriend's family.  Anyway, with you here, we (STH denizens) now control a continguous territory in the Midwest and upper mountain area comprising Illinois (Selkie), Michigan (the K brothers and Christian), Ohio near West Virginia (Slickevil), and Kentucky (Timmy Bauer).  Folks in that area have managed to get together at local cons on at least a couple of occasions recently.

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We've also got J. White and Sesshoumaru covering my back here in the Prairie State. Just had to comment that I am wildly amused by the idea of a STH Midwestern territory, especially as now having a Hoosier member ensures that I don't have to leave that territory to travel to the Novi convention. Welcome, AP-with-the-cool-user-name! (And other new members who've joined since I last popped into this thread).

And did my eyes deceive me, or does the STH Estrogen Brigade also have some new members?

-Artistic stuff

This has more to do with my ability to ever get anything done of any quality. I find most of my efforts horribly amateurish, and I have a hard time seeing what I can do to find some creative outlet where I can develop stuff with others to a point where it becomes something I can genuinely be proud of.

 

Anyway, that's it basically.

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I'm the last one to offer advice on improving one's political or romantic life, but although I'm far from a great artist, may I interject a couple of thoughts on the artistic side of things?

(1) Do something else for a while. Doesn't matter what - in fact, best if it's something you don't consider your artistic calling. Paint, draw, sculpt, whatever. Just do it. You'll find that exercising that part of your brain in an area where you have no preconceived notion of how good you're supposed to be or want to be can be very refreshing. I never ceased to be amazed at how well this trick can work.

(2) A lesson from the pottery world, one that I have to remind myself of often but which has been born out in my own experience.

A famous potter who taught classes to beginners decided to try a little experiment, later published in one of the major clay magazines. He divided his class into two halves. One half was told that their rades would depend solely on the number of pots they threw; quality didn't matter, only quantity. The other half was told that each person's grade would be based solely on the quality of one single piece.

At the end of the session, he discovered that the "quantity" people not only had made more pots, they had, across the board, made better pots that the "quality" group.

The lesson? Keep at it. Good, bad, or indifferent. Every potter has a quota of X number of truly awful pots in them, and the sooner s/he gets them out of the way, the sooner s/he can make the good ones trapped inside.

kinki: Major kudos on getting away from your scary ex. Not nearly enough people try, let alone succeed, at getting out of bad relationships. I tip my hat to you.

Inca, my best. I hope Red's cryptic mention that you have good things in the offing pans out - and if it's something artistic, please do share with the rest of us if you're able!

(with apologies to all for everyone I've missed, and the latest of my replies. The less said about my life this week, the better. A plague on all the doctors).

Mickey Eye, sorry to be late in responding.

For what it's worth, I suspect that U.S. officials are going to be more concerned about the country that issued your passport and the color of your skin (sorry to say) than the fact that you've visited Iran.

However....

The pyhysical security thing sounds damn scary to me, both in terms of the risk of attack and the inherent danger of the work itself (whatever that may be - obviously you wouldn't have mentioned it if it weren't a concern). Don't know what to advise, but I'd concern the danger of being maimed or killed reason enough to turn it down and find another job. The moral issue of benefiting the Iranian government would choke me, personally, although for the sake of your sanity I hope it's something that will at least peripherally benefit the Iranian people, even if the benefit is "potential, and down the road."

I certainly don't envy you the dilemma. It's really easy for someone sitting securely at a computer in another country to talk casually about "Oh, just get another job." I don't know whether that's a realistic option for you or not. Speaking as someone with specialized skills and limited job options, I can certainly understand that sometimes YOUR economic survival has to trump other concerns. For your sake, I hope it doesn't come down to that. How long would the duration of the project be?

Maddi, that operation sounds seriously scary. Whatever you decide, my best to you.

GenGris, how are you doing? I know you've been through a rough patch too.

pooka, good luck on the job opportunity. Fingers, toes, and puppy dog tails crossed on your behalf.

There used to be a comic book retailers' forum over at Delphi. Don't know whether it still exists, but well worth searching out if you haven't already.

As for what I want? Clean, well-organized, heavy on the indie/alternative selection, lots of TPBs I can't find at Amazon, and (I can't stress this enough) FRIENDLY, HELPFUL STAFF. I don't need my hand held while I'm shopping, but a basic friendly smile, hello, did you find everything you need? from a clean, well-dressed employee goes a long way. I hate being treated like an imposition on the employee's time, doubly so if I'm treated as though I'm interrupting his conversation with someone else about who was the one and only true Green Lantern. Back issues? Unless you're going the golden/silver age collectibles, think "marked down" rather than "marked up", unless there's a very compelling reason to raise the price on a particular issue. Encourage special orders for material not in stock - no one expects you to have everything ever printed in the medium in stock - but when you do, for Og's sake, follow through and keep me informed if there's a delay.

Oh, and a lesson learned from the two major stores left within a reasonable drive of my house: watch the music. One of the best stores I've ever seen doesn't get my business because of the heavy metal music played at ear-bleeding levels.

I'm a nay-sayer on the gaming area, unless that's what you want to be your focus. There's probably more money in gaming than comics, so focusing on the former is not necessarily a bad thing but it is a slightly different thing. I personally don't want gaming going on my comic shop any more than I do in a bookstore. Noisy, disruptive, and - so I've been told - responsible for many five fingered discounts while the owner's back is turned and/or during tournaments held during off-hours. I do know that as a customer, people who are at a store to game are often, how shall I say this delicately, not the kind of clientele I particularly enjoy spending any more time than necessary around. Not all, by any stretch, but enough to make me uncomfortable if I so much as hear the word "gaming."

I have officially become a grumpy old lady. I'm currently updating the collection spreadsheet that my family will use to identify everything in the event of my death.

How's that for an entertaining Friday night activity? I so need a new boyfriend - and not one that lives a thousand miles away, this time.

Kansas redefines "Science"

.... alllowing more latitude for discussion of the Flying Spaghetti Monster in the classroom.

... and Selkie makes three. Even if I could overcome my deep-seated aversion to rugrats, I'd make a terrible parent. I'd try to be a good one, but I know I couldn't do it. I melt at the sight of puppies, kittens, foals, tadpoles, even baby gorillas - but baby humans? Forget it.

Don't let me start on how fast I'd go ballistic when trying to participate in "mommy culture".....

I'm with you on that one, Inca. Ouch. Based on the tension between Pullo & Vorenus in the aftermath, I'm starting to wonder whether one will wind up being pitted directly against the other - which also can not end well. I was a little surprised Niobe hadn't ever mentioned anything to Vorenus before. Although that character development wouldn't have rated major pillow talk, I would have thought that she might have mentioned something at some point.

I love Arrested development so much it hurts. I missed most of the first episode on Monday (drat), but by the end of the second one I was rolling on the ground.

Bones surprised me last night by improving so much it approached striking distance of decent. For perhaps the first time ever, I'm almost disappointed at the improvement, for I was watching it solely to mock it. Once it achieves perfectly ordinary, mediocre but not awful television standards (the highest point I can imagine it achieving), I'm going to have a Tuesday night gap to fill on my viewing schedule.

Lunch, a few days ago:

A "protein bomb" burrito, consisting of extra virgin olive oil, shredded mozzarella, grilled chicken strips, soy beans, feta cheese, swiss cheese, wrapped in a soft taco shell.

...did I miss someone?

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Yes. me, back on page 1.

As always, the well wishes, support, and righteous indignation are greatly appreciated. I won't bore everyone with the details of yesterday's "Well, if only you had health insurance..." speech from my doctor. I have no doubt it would result in smoke pouring out of the ears of more than one forum member, and I'd hate to be the cause of smoke alarms going off around the world.

(pooka, yes on the thyroid test, the result of which I'm assured is "perfectly normal.")

On a happier note, raven cup! These pictures do it no justice, either in terms of form or glaze, but you get the general idea. The picture showing the pentagrams is a little closer to the actual color.

And on the happiest note of all:

WOO HOO BEN! YOU GO, GUY!

We want pics of the raven!

If the glaze permits, I will. The glaze is stunning in person - a lovely soft pewter with a black pearl sheen - but in the past proved almost impossible to photograph successfully.

I believe that is your body's way of preserving itself. You can only lose so much weight by, well, starving yourself before your body does something to keep enough fat to survive. I know I'm not very technical.

You have to exercise and eat a dietary balanced meal plan to lose weight after the initial starving.

Note that I'm not telling you to lose anymore weight. I have no idea what your body looks like and don't want you killing yourself! I'm just offering some random info here, ok?

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Yeah, I know. The problem is that I'm not on starvation rations because I want to be, it's because my body can't seem to digest food. Exercise is out of the question because of the fatigue, and the pain, which worsens drastically the more I move. I do suspect that that the abrupt cessation of weight loss is in fact related to my body trying to preserve itself, but criminy, if I'm maintaining weight eating next to nothing, how ungodly slowly must my metabolism be working? I was concerned when I was losing almost a pound a day, but there has to be some middle ground.I find it weird that I went from massive weight loss to almost none in a matter of days, while not changing my diet or exercise at all. Almost a decade of undiagnosed medical conditions that severely restricted my ability to move have left me with plenty of weight to lose, and although - in light of everything else - shedding it wasn't a high priority I would like there to be some upside to all this grief!

I hate my body.

Hi guys.

My symptoms are worsening rapidly. Don't worry, I'm not in imminent peril of dropping dead or anything, I just feel miserable. And, dammit, I've stopped losing weight. I would never starve myself to lose weight, but if I have to live on a daily caloric intake and diet insufficient to sustain a rabbit, then is it to much to ask that I lose weight as a byproduct?! Weight loss is supposed to decrease the pain I'm in, but that's only getting worse too.

On the plus side, the raven cup I fired last night came out breathtakingly beautiful. I can't stop looking at it, and it's nice to have something attractive to focus on.

Count me in.

Original plan is now officially abandoned.  I'm seriously considering transforming him into Lucifer, the closest candidate for the thing I've made.

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Oh DO! And then post pics of him! Pleeeeease. :happy:

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If the beady-eyed little mutant turns out to be remotely decent, I promise he'll show up in Show Your Wares. My mother, who worked with high end scale miniatures for years, just loves him, and she never praises my work so maybe he's better than I think he is. Normally I have a very Zen attitude whenever the clay develops a will of its own, but this guy's arrogance in doing his will instead of mine frustrates me. How very Lucifer of him.

Alas, massive doses of pain prevented me from spending any quality time with Mr. Pointy today. The best I could do was tend the kiln for a long, sllloooowwww firing of a very persnickety glaze. The lone piece inside is a hard-thrown cup made by a friend of mine, with one of my raven designs sprigged on. If the glaze behaves, it should be quite attractive. I hope so, because my creative spirits could use the boost.

Carla Speed McNeil's Finder is what ultimately won me over.

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Hmpf, I'm curious: how did you even learn about Finder. It's a terrific comic, but one that (in my perception, at least) only the hardest of hardcore fans ever, well, find.

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Of course, if, as an artist, you want visual beauty, you should give European comics a try, too.

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Off the top of my head, I'd recommend the following (all available in English)

Epileptic

Blacksad (multiple volumes)

Cities of the Fantastic (hard to locate, but what I've seen of the art makes my head explode)

The White Lama

MISS: Better Living Through Crime (I suggest finding the greyscale edition rather than the recently published color version)

Amongst the American books, I'm surprised no one's mentioned Nobody yet, especially for a recently converted female Hellblazer reader.

Courtney Crumrin from Oni Press is another natural recommendation.

Christian, I think you'll be very pleased with it. I think it may be even better in the intimacy of a home viewing experience, but it's such a pleasure that it'll be well worth watching more than once.

I'll be intensely curious to see how (or even if) this film plays to non-U.S. audiences.

Oh yes, the 'celebrating the macabre' thing I get totally (I was at a goth festival decked out in black trying to look moody that weekend)-

And I get to see pictures on the "Oi, Selkie" thread ... when?

it's the way it's been commercially hijacked and watered down into 'let's make as much money from crap costumes aimed at kids' thing I hate

Yeah, I suppose that would get annoying if I weren't in a position to overlook it.

- and the way kids demand money and a good old pick and mix of sweeties ain't good enough any more!

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That would be deeply annoying if I had to experience it. Actually, this year the family and I were astounded at how exceptionally appreciative, polite and nice all the kids were. If I had to put up with bratty kids, especially the kind of behavior Mark describes, I probably wouldn't be as bullish on the holiday either.

kris, don't even get me started on the milennium hoo-ha. I had just finished an emergency job as Y2k compliance manager for offices in five countries at my company, and was blank-eyed nuts by the time the big day occurred. I had learned the week before that a group of employee had committed sabotage directed at me personally, I'd had to order the entire Netherlands network unplugged at one point to comply with a well-intended but not well-thought out directive from the parent company, and I was exhausted beyond words. I drove to the home of a recently separated friend who lived far enough away that had all hell broken loose, I couldn't possibly be expected to set foot in the office, clutched my mobile phone praying it wouldn't ring, and celebrated that nothing bad happened so I didn't lose my job.

Good Night, and Good Luck is a small gem of a movie. Its loose, conversational structure does a terrific job of fooling the mind into thinking of it as a period documentary rather than a scripted piece of fiction. The incorporation of archival footage is absolutely seamless, too. David Strathairn - an actor I always enjoy, and whom I see far too little of - positively melts into the central role. If this performance doesn't make people sit up and take notice, I don't know what will.

Best of all, the film does an amazing job of portraying heroism as a series of small, courageous acts taken within a system not set up - or setting out - to change the world. There's no rousing speech, no crossing of the Rubicon, just incremental steps - sometimes difficult steps, admittedly - toward reaching a greater good. The risks and consequences of those actions are vividly illustrated, but in a subtle and elegant manner

This film is definitely aiming at the Farenheit 9/11 crowd, but instead of hitting viewers over the head with anvils, it whispers in their ear.

Delightful, and well worth attending.

and another thing. Bloody Halloween. It's that time of year when you're a prisoner in your own home while marauding gangs of kids roam around trying to extort money off you or else they'll fart the national anthem. Oh joy.

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HERETIC! :o :icon_evil:

Halloween is the perfect holiday. It's the one time a year where one gets to celebrate the macabre, and there's no pressure to participate. No "so-and-so didn't give me as expensive a gift as I gave him" competitiveness, no godawful Victorian carols being blasted in every public location, no forced cheerfulness, no frigging Hallmark cards.

Happy Birthday! Best of luck on the exam.

I miss Tigger. :icon_cry:

On a happier note, I ran with the pain-free interludes to spend some quality time with Mr. Pointy, the porcupine quill I use in sculpting. I made the best human face (and have a good start on the corresponding body) I've ever done, although that doesn't exactly put it up in distinguished company. I had a very specific plan for who it was to be and exactly how it should look. Unfortunately for my ego, that plan did not call for creating the androgynous bastard love child of Zatara and Jenny Sparks. Original plan is now officially abandoned. I'm seriously considering transforming him into Lucifer, the closest candidate for the thing I've made.

Received the official call for entries for the Art Show at the Dog yesterday. Mixed feelings - warm fuzzy nostalgia for last year's acceptance, and sadness that I have no new work to enter this year. In theory I could cast and pour my Yorkie, but realistically in my condition there's no way I'll have it done in time.

You've piqued my interest.  If it hasn't been covered here before, and you think it would be appropriate, why do you think neo-Paganism is on the rise now?

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This post deleted because I thought of a much more coherent way to express my thoughts, but it'll have to wait until another day.