I feel like I should say something because it’s the end of the year, and decade¹. And also because I haven’t updated in awhile. So.

I was thinking about why I never update, and it’s because I feel like every post needs to be long and have a central thesis and be well thought out.² That’s what the original point of this blog was, sort of, several years ago. But I don’t actually have a lot of deep, thinky posts in me, and it seems silly to feel like I can’t post on my own personal blog unless it’s something big and deep, when I am a small and rarely deep person. So: either I’ll post more in the upcoming year, but it will be less thoughtful, or I will continue to not post much. Either way. Shrug.

Regarding goals I had for this year: I didn’t accomplish any of them. Whoops? This was the first year in ages I’d bothered making any sort of resolutions, and now I remember why I don’t usually. But actually, it’s pretty indicative of my year in general. It wasn’t a bad year, but I didn’t have a lot of forward motion in it. So I’ve got some sort of mental goals for the upcoming year, but I don’t feel like putting them out on the internet, so I won’t. So there.

Let’s see. Other things I can talk about…

We got a Wii fit! If my year was stagnant, well, so was I; aside from the three months of physical therapy for my wrists, I don’t think I did anything involving working out or moving or not sitting on my ass. My sister thought the Wii Fit would be fun, and so it is. I’ve worked out more in the last week than in the few months leading up to it, which is good.

Good, fun things: I was skeptical of how much actual working out would happen with a video game, and I still have no idea how accurate it really is in terms of calories burnt and such. But I certainly feel like I’ve worked out after I’m done for the day. If nothing else, it’s moving and stretching, and I’ve recently rediscovered the muscles in my thighs and abs. So there’s that!

I also like working out with it because it is super fun. Little Mii characters are constantly applauding and encouraging you, even for things like jogging, which I absolutely hate doing, you know, in real life. (Also: it’s cold outside, but warm in my apartment.) And, dorky confession that should surprise absolutely no one who knows me at all, when we first got the Wii we made a whole bunch of silly Miis based on TV and movie characters. I… may have made the entire cast of High School Musical.³ But jogging is way more fun with, say, Chad Danforth!⁴

On the other hand, it’s pretty problematic in that if it measures your BMI as above “normal,” or you gain weight between days, it berates you. That’s neither healthy nor helpful; at best, it’s obnoxious, and at worst, potentially triggering for people with disordered eating.

(And on a personal level, it makes fun of me. Much of the Fit’s whole shebang is based around balance and posture; and while my posture is pretty great, thanks to the physical therapy, my balance… uh… Look, some of us failed out of ballet class when we were four because we fell over too much, even for toddlers. Why yes, Wii Fit, I do often fall down in my daily life, thanks so much for asking sarcastically.)

Other than that, not much going on. I’m on vacation for a week and I enjoy sitting around doing nothing quite a bit.⁵ For at least the third (probably fourth) year in a row, I’m going to do New Years karaoke tonight. Should be good times.

Here, have something adorable to end your year with:

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• 

If I was the sort of blogger who wrote things on a timely basis, this post would have been up during the ALCS when I first thought about it, or at least during the World Series, when it was topical, or shortly thereafter, when people were still buzzing. But I’ve been busy with work, that novel I’m perpetually working on, and meeting some of my favorite authors. And I’m not that sort of blogger. Alas.

So. Baseball. And feminism!

The school where my sister teaches had a Yankees-themed dress-down day when the Yankees won the World series.¹ She stopped at a Modell’s store to pick up a jersey to wear, and found only men’s larges and extra larges — and a very few women’s shirts, all in pastel pink.

I don’t actually know any women who want pink Yankees gear. The blue pinstripes? Pretty iconic, is all I’m saying. Rachel asked a salesman if there was anything else for women, and he said no. They never bother to order jerseys for women. Imagine that.²

I went to see a game with my friend B this summer. B is a much harder-core fan than I am, actually, and when we were talking about how we got into watching, she said I was one of the only women she knows who watches baseball like she does — or, in other words, who watches baseball like a dude.

But, she said, it was nice to see a game with another woman because she didn’t have to avoid talking about how Derek Jeter is wicked hot.

Yup. That’s my experience, too. Because that’s the thing about talking baseball with dudes. There’s an awesome feeling of being in-group, and what’s more fun than talking about something you love with people who are similarly passionate? But for me and B both — and, I suspect, a lot of other female sports fans — there’s an unspoken knowledge that commenting on a player’s attractiveness means you will be out-grouped instantly. Your opinions will be taken less seriously, and instead of a real fan, you’ll be seen as one of those women, who only watches the game for eye candy or because your boyfriend makes you.³

The thing is, this is not something that happens in reverse. For some reason, a sports-centric magazine with a primarily male audience puts out a yearly edition that’s devoted to women in swimsuits, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t a magazine about sports. ⁴ Movie reviews nearly always comment on the female lead’s attractiveness, but even when written by men, the reviews aren’t discounted out of hand, on the grounds that people assume men only watch movies to stare at the women. And often, female athletes are uber-sexualized, and their looks are considered at least as important as their skills.⁵

So maybe I do watch baseball like a dude, because apparently even sitting on my couch watching the YES Network is a gendered activity. (Sigh.) But I also watch baseball like a chick. Because, whether you believe in Derek Jeter’s intangibles or Derek Jeter’s actual defensive statistics?

Dude is wicked hot.

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• 

So I took the day off to go to the Yankees tickertape parade¹. Now I’m home, I’ve napped, cuddled my cat, and I’m watching Roseanne on lifetime because I love this show.² And a commercial just aired for some kind of pre-made pancake batter.

It looks like every other pancake commercial ever. Happy family, messy kids, smiling mom, and end with a close up of the final product: a stack of delicious pancakes with a small square pad of butter on top, and plenty of syrup coating the whole shebang. It’s kind of the iconic image of pancakes.

But my question is: whaaaa?

Who eats them like that? With the pad of butter on top and then syrup. I mean, yes, butter on pancakes is delicious, and as far as I’m concerned, the more syrup, the better.³ But you don’t just want a mouthful of butter. You want it spread across the pancake, right? And if you’ve put the syrup on before you spread that butter pad out, you won’t really be able to.

Basically, that iconic pancake stack looks lovely, but it is not an accurate depiction of real pancake-eating life. I object!

Anyway.

Fire, Kristin Cashore’s second novel, is a sort of prequel/companion to Graceling, her debut. I loved Graceling so much that I gave a copy to my Dad, since we have similar tastes and all. But, while not a bad read, Fire doesn’t quite live up to its predecessor. Though it was good enough for me to assume it’s a sophomore slump, and thus I shall look forward to more from Cashore anyway. Review over at Active Voice.

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• 

While I’ve occasionally written about Disney here, I’m not sure the nerdy High School Musical fangirl has ever come out. So, for those of you who’ve never had the, uh, pleasure of hearing me talk about it person: I love High School Musical. Like… Love. Like, I have poster of Corbin Bleu in my bedroom and carry my MetroCard in a plastic HSM wallet and have a poster hanging above my desk at work. I saw the third movie in the theater three times. And I will watch, essentially, anything with a HSM alum in it.

Anything.

Which is why I not only watched I Kissed a Vampire — a parody rock musical webseries featuring HSM alumns Lucas Grabeel and Drew Seeley — but also went to the premier.

Pro: Lucas Grabeel and Drew Seeley were there! I love them! A lot!

Con: It was really, really bad. (Review over at Tweenage Wasteland.)

But on the upside, look at how cute these gentlemen are! I love them!

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• 

I’ve been on vacation for a few days, and it has been wonderful. This is my first-ever “adult” vacation, which is not nearly as racy as it sounds; all I mean is that it’s the first one I’ve ever planned and paid for by myself. I took a few days off of work, flew down to Georgia, and visited one of my best friends. (Also the World of Coke. It was like returning to the mothership. I am basically a walking brand advertisement to begin with…)

Anyway, another lovely thing about travel-heavy vacation? Hours of uninterrupted reading time! Aside from the books in my previous post, I also finished Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld and reviewed it over at AV. Enjoy!

As for me, back to work tomorrow. Boo. But at least I feel nicely recharged!

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• 

Most of the books I read are either not things I have enough thoughts on to bother writing reviews of, or fold into the genres we review at AV. But here are a couple that don’t, that are worth talking about:


Dani Noir by Nova Ren Suma
Fade-in on thirteen-year-old Dani Callanzano. It’s the summer before eighth grade, and Dani’s stuck in her nowhere mountain town with only her favorite noir mysteries at the Little Art Movie Theatre to keep her company. But when a big secret invades the scene in real life, Dani decides to bring the truth to light.

Full disclosure: I picked this book up because the author, Nova Ren Suma, is a lovely person who I know from a forum and have met for coffee once. Generally, when browsing, I lean more towards scifi/fantasy (shock, I know), but I think I probably would have picked up Dani regardless, because the title is catchy, the cover is gorgeous, and the idea of a tween girl heroine who loves noir movies is awesome.¹

The book stands up. It’s very voice-y, and Dani is a great character. She’s interesting, but not always very nice, striking a great balance as a character who was often selfish and inconsiderate, but still likable; whose motivations are always clear and make her bad behavior understandable, even sympathetic. But what really stood out to me were two elements. First, the setting, a small town in upstate NY. Hey, I’m from one of those! I kept smiling at the descriptions throughout. My town is actually even more rural and much smaller than Dani’s, but it’s also a town where all the adults know who all of the kids are, where someone might see you when you’re hiding and call your mom because everyone knows everyone’s business.

Then there was Taylor. Taylor had been Dani’s best friend growing up, but they’d grown apart; Taylor was kind of weird and nerdy, and Dani was frustrated with her for not getting that maybe the friendship was past its sell-by date. The friendship story arch was great, but it also made me cringe and have to read through my fingers like I was watching a horror movie, because I am Taylor. Or at least, I was when I was in middle school.

Actually, that got me thinking: I’ve always read scifi/fantasy as escapism, and someday I’ll probably write a much longer post on that.² But reading about the relationship between Dani and Taylor drove that home to me: genre fiction is much further removed from my own experiences, and I’m much more comfortable reading it. But the fact that it made me cringe is, I think, a testament to how right the book gets things.

Liar, by Justine Larbalestier

I was born with a light covering of fur.
After three days it had all fallen off, but the damage was done. My mother stopped trusting my father because it was a family condition he had not told her about. One of many omissions and lies.
My father is a liar and so am I.
But I’m going to stop. I have to stop.
I will tell you my story and I will tell it straight. No lies, no omissions.
That’s my promise.
This time I truly mean it.

There isn’t nearly as much to say about this one. Or rather, there is. There’s lots and lots to say about it, because I’m not going to.

The author put out a plea for people not to give out — or read — spoilers. I sort of shrugged that off originally; I don’t really seek spoilers, but I’m generally indifferent when I stumble upon them.

You don’t want to be spoiled for Liar.

It’s a psychological thriller, but not at all what I expected going into it, even though I’ve been reading the author’s blog since before she began writing it and had also read all of the promo material. All of the elements within it are laid down brilliantly; I can’t say I saw the (first) big twist coming, but there was enough there that, blown away as I was, it also all made sense. The rest of it? I’m still trying to pin down what was truth and what was lie, and who actually committed the crime.

I finished it and handed it to my best friend almost immediately, so she could read it and I’d have someone to discuss the ending with. It’s already on my reread list. And, having read nearly everything else by Larbalestier,³ I feel pretty confident in saying it’s her best book.

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• 

Running laundry in my building is like doing a word problem for a middle school math class: there are six washing machines, but three of them hold only half as much as the other three. Of the larger three washing machines, only one actually works. There are three dryers. All of them work, but the first two cost more than the third to achieve the same level of dryness. However, the third sometimes eats laundry tokens rather than drying your clothing. Assuming optimal conditions in which none of the washers or dryers are already in use, how many tokens do you need in order to run two loads of laundry in the most efficient manner?

And then there’s the laundry token issue in and of itself. The washers and dryers don’t take quarters, only tokens — not that there is a sign explaining this anywhere, which was very confusing the first time I tried to run laundry and no machines would take my change. There also isn’t a token dispenser or anything helpful like that. To acquire tokens, you have to knock the super’s door and ask his wife for them.

This is complicated by three factors. First, the wife — who’s name I don’t know, which I should really rectify one of these days — isn’t always home, and no one else in their family speaks English, and I only speak English, so trading quarters for tokens requires a lot of elaborate hand gestures. Second, I have an almost pathological fear of bothering people, so needless to say, knocking on the door and asking someone to stop what she’s doing to give me tokens is really, really, really not my favorite thing. Third, about half the time, they’re entirely out of tokens anyway.

We’ve been living in this building for well over a year, so I’ve mostly learned to deal with all of this. But there are still weeks where I’d rather buy five new pairs of underwear than go to the trouble of getting laundry tokens and then trying to negotiate the actual washers and dryers.

–

I feel weird and self conscious writing about writing here. Can’t quite explain why. But here goes.

It’s coming up on National Novel Writing Month, wherein people strive to write a 50,000 word novel in 30 days. I know a lot of people who are signed up already and getting psyched, writing outlines, totally geared up to go. I, however, am not one of them.

Way back in January, I made passing reference to trying to get a manuscript into shape to start submitting to agents by the end of the year. This is not going to happen. But I have revised that goal a little: I’d like to have my current round of revisions done by the end of the year. I’m not at a point where Nano, as much fun as it is (and it is!) would help.

Or rather: I’ve done Nano successfully four times (2001, 2002, 2004, and 2007). I am totally secure in my ability to write a whole lot in a short time period. And I got a lot out of Nano, beyond four unreadably bad novellas. It really did help me get into the habit of coming home from class (and later work) and opening up my project, sitting down and getting to work, and getting a heck of a lot accomplished.

But I can do that now. I know I can. Writing messy first drafts is not my problem, and motivating myself to work on them regularly is also not my problem. I have plenty of rough drafts, finished but never revised, sitting around on my hard drive or printed out and gathering dust. I love writing rough drafts. I love discovering things, world building, working out story structure, and getting lost in it all with no pressure for it to be good. I can do that. I’ve done that.

What I’ve never done is made the leap from a jumbled bunch of good ideas to a polished version that I’m not embarrassed by the thought of other humans reading. I’m not good at revising. It intimidates the crap out of me. And when I’m not going “Aaaaugh, how do I do this???” I find myself going, “Aaaaaugh, why did I ever think I could write well, this is the worst prose that has ever happened, omg I give up.” And then I give up and write another rough draft of a different project.

So it’s time. I’ve got a very rough, but I think salvageable, manuscript draft. Writing it from the ground up took me about three months, if you take out the few months in the middle when my computer broke and I lost everything and then was too busy sulking about what I’d lost to get back to work. So I’m hoping three months will also be adequate to make this next leap. What I’m looking at now, I think, is about 2/3 rewriting to 1/3 revising existing text — with frequent pauses to polish the bits I’ve rewritten, which is not something I usually do when writing rough drafts.

So that’s my plan. I’m putting it out here because making it public makes it feel real to me, and I do better with an actual deadline. Wish me luck. (And to all you Nano-ites out there, have fun!)

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• 

So I watched the VMAs last night, and I’m still pissed at Kanye West.¹ I’ve been thinking about why I’m so upset all day, because until last night, I could not have named one Taylor Swift song. She’s been remarkably off my radar, considering I contribute to a blog about tween- and teen stars; I knew her name, knew what she looked like, but her music had made zero impression on me at all. So it isn’t even like I’m offended because I love her or her music particularly; I’m basically entirely indifferent to her. And obviously it was a totally dick move, wrong just because it was wrong, and it would have been wrong regardless of who he interrupted.

But it really, really bothered me. I think I finally got a bead on why: because female performers — especially young, female, pop performers — really don’t get much respect.

I think part of that is the genre generally. Pop music tends to be dismissed out of hand by many, many people, as “just” pop. Growing up loving boybands and Britney Spears, I’ve heard time and time again that pop stars just don’t have musical credibility, because they often don’t write the songs they perform. That has always struck me as utter bullshit because here’s the thing: writing music and singing are different skillsets. They are related, in that they both have to do with music, and one is often found in tandem with the other, but they don’t have to be. Honestly, when I’m listening to music, I rarely care who wrote it. I’m listening for performance; when I’m at a concert, I’m there to be entertained. I respect the people who do the writing and the producing, but they aren’t the ones who make the musical experience for me. Basically, what I want from a singer is that she be a good singer.²

And even were that not true, I think it’s important to remember that female entertainers are least likely to be given the creative freedom to do what they want. Another reason it’s easy to dismiss pop (and especially women in pop) is because it’s all about crafted image (though… what isn’t?). But, as Kelly Clarkson called out, the industry is a boy’s club, and people didn’t want to listen to her because she was young and female. If these young, female stars lack credibility because their images are so carefully crafted… Well, who is doing the crafting? And would these young women be given a chance to put themselves out there and make music at all if they didn’t submit to that image crafting?³

And of course, there’s the fact that pop music is fun. It’s not generally designed to be moving, or deep, or even Great Art. Pop is meant to be…popular. It is entertainment that does not strive to be anything but entertainment. And fun is often seen as frivolous.

So thought number one: pop musicians, especially young, female ones, don’t get much respect because they — and their genre — are seen as lacking credibility, even though that that’s an unfair statement.

But to go further with that, you know why else pop music is dismissed so easily? How about this one: because girls like it.

Seriously. This is not a terribly original thought, but it’s always run true to me. Speaking in broad cultural terms, things that guys value are considered normal; things that women value are seen as frivolous. To talk in clichés: sports vs. shopping. It’s not that every single person is accepting of guys who just want to watch the game (or get more fanatic about it); it’s that culturally, that’s considered normal. On the other hand, women shopping is a punchline, seen as silly. LOL ladies spending money on things like clothing and — hee hee hee — shoes! The attitude is derisive. Projects that are by women, for women, are written off as chick flicks (and chick lit). Women enjoying things by and for themselves is not particularly welcomed.⁴ Things by and for women are not particularly valued.

So you’ve got young female artists in a genre that isn’t considered credible, who are primarily popular with other young, female people and thus their art (even if it is not High Art) is easily dismissed. That upsets me. And even though I have just about no opinion on Taylor Swift, that moment at the VMAs pretty much encapsulated that mindset: young women and the things they value aren’t important, so an adult man felt it was entirely okay to interrupt a young woman who was receiving recognition for being good at what she does.

Obviously, there is a lot more to talk about than that, like how it also stole Beyonce’s moment and put her into the position of having to clean up someone else’s mess; whether or not people would be this outraged if a white man had done what Kanye did, or if it had been done to a black woman instead; and why MTV has an awards show to recognize outstanding music videos when it does not, in fact, play music videos.⁵ But that’s why the incident got to me, in particular. I love pop, and I love teen stars, and I absolutely hate how culturally disrespected they are.

One final note: I’ve had a couple of discussions today about how this is all actually good for Swift, because this has gotten her major exposure and made her a national figure of sympathy. I do get that, but I also think it’s important not lose track of the fact that Swift was getting national exposure and recognition for being good at her job, and that was ruined for her. I have no idea whether she’d trade in that moment of joy and respect for a larger moment of controversy and exposure — but I know I’d rather see a young woman get the respect she has earned than see her get humiliated. And I hope that she would feel the same.

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• 

I keep trying to write an entry here about writing, but then getting too self-conscious about it. Maybe someday. In the mean time, when not able to come up with interesting content of my own, why not link to some other people’s content instead?

When I go through my Google Reader these days, I tend to go through interesting links using Read It Later, a FF add-on that I love. But unfortunately, this means I don’t have a way to tag posts with where they were linked from anymore, and so I don’t have credits for these. Suffice to say, they were all linked by awesome people.

Vague theme: feminism! Mostly but not entirely in sf/f!

And she’s cute, too!

So I opened up the email, and sure enough, it started off with a compliment about the usefulness of a particular article that I’d written. Great. Warm fuzzies abound. Unfortunately, the warm fuzzies vacated the premises in the next paragraph, in which the (male) writer concluded with the sentiment that it was nice to read such good articles written by “a cutie”.

I think I may have said something very rude at that point. It certainly left me feeling uncomfortable and a little creeped-out.

The problem I have with this isn’t just in the assumption that it’s OK for a total stranger (who I’ve never even seen in person) to comment on my appearance. It’s in the implication that the technical merit of my writing isn’t the important part here — that what’s important is how physically attractive I am. (And in particular with the form of words used, not just “cute”, but “a cutie”, which is a very neat way to suggest that everything important about a person can be encapsulated in their appearance.)

Yeah. It’s happened to me, too, and I don’t know what to say. Generally, women are socialized to want to be cute, to be recognized for that; but it’s so, so, so frustrating when that’s absolutely not what you want.

Off With Her Head? Why Fantasy Hates Good Queens

A few weeks ago we had a ball discussing the Top Ten Evil Queens of fantasy. But something occurred to me as I was doing my research: While I had no trouble finding evil queens, the only ones I could find that were depicted as being “good” were physically compromised in some way. (And I’m not talking about princesses here — I mean women in real seats of power.) The question this raises for me is, does power corrupt or are powerful women seen as dangerous in fantasy? Let’s take a look at the way good queens are hobbled to find out.

This makes me want to write a fantasy novel about a kick-ass queen immediately.

Are We Letting Boys Be Book Bigots?

We need to teach them to take an interest in all sorts of stories, not just the ones that feature kids like them. This means exposing them to a lot of different stuff. We should, of course, encourage kids to find themselves in books. That’s a wonderful and powerful thing. But we should help them find people who are different, too, so they learn to value other ways of being in the world. If we don’t support books, movies, TV programs and music that show these other ways of being, then we are contributing to the problem.

This is a debate I keep running in to: Will boys only read books about boys? I love this article for doing a take-down of why that’s an attitude that has got to go. Of course everyone wants kids generally to read more, and it seems like boys read less than girls; but focusing books more on boys and what’s culturally considered boy-themed stories is really not the answer.

Speaking of boys, girls, and characters…

Ladies, Please (Carry On Being Awesome)

I certainly have seen girl characters who were too perfect: who were beloved by all, beautiful (though they always thought their mouth was too wide or possibly their bosom too generous), and eventually elected queen of the universe. (Sometimes literally.)

Let us think of the Question of Harry Potter. I do not mean to bag on the character of Harry Potter: I am very fond of him.

But I think people would be less fond of him if he was Harriet Potter. If he was a girl, and she’d had a sad childhood but risen above it, and she’d found fast friends, and been naturally talented at her school’s only important sport, and saved the day at least seven times. If she’d had most of the boys in the series fancy her, and mention made of boys following her around admiring her. If the only talent she didn’t have was dismissed by her guy friend who did have it. If she was often told by people of her numerous awesome qualities, and was in fact Chosen by Fate to be awesome.

Well, then she’d be just like Harry Potter, but a girl. But I don’t think people would like her as much.

Indeed!

And finally…

now that we’ve got that clear, and you know that i’m not here…

One of the first things I ever did in the course of this dialogue was to reject the knee-jerk judgment of the Spock/Uhura relationship as a sexist reduction of Uhura to The Girlfriend role, some sort of sad step backwards from her empowered position in TOS as a professional woman with no need for a romance. …

However, the Just A Girlfriend nugget and the assertion that she is made less by her romantic involvement with Spock continues unabated, so I figured I’d give full voice to what I hadn’t before.

Simply put: Nyota Uhura is not a white girl.

(Via the previous article)

I really appreciated this. I grew up on TOS, and definitely super enjoyed (but didn’t 100% love) the reboot movie. ¹ But I definitely grew up on the narrative about Uhura as a career woman, and how that was totally progressive and awesome, and it never occurred to me to look at why she was depicted that way (let alone to question its awesomeness).

My eyes: opened. Always a good things.

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• 

In an attempt to be productive, I actually wrote a book review! Check it out over at AV: The True Meaning of Smekday by Adam Rex.

That’s done. Next: laundry, shower, maybe cook dinner at some point…? Happy Labor Day, y’all.

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