Resistance is Futile...

• Leave me a comment saying "Resistance is Futile."
• I'll respond by asking you five questions so I can satisfy my curiosity
• Update your journal with the answers to the questions
• Include this explanation in the post and offer to ask other people questions

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1) What sort of costuming do you have planned for next weekend?

Well, steam punk presumeably. More specifically, it will probably involve fancy skirts and corsetry. And crinolines. And a huge modded handgun with a custom holster. And thigh high stockings. I don't know more specifics because I'm not 100% sure yet.

2) Celebrity lust object?

Helena Bonham Carter, so long as she's insane.

3) What do you get out of cons?

New friends with the same interests, flirtation, tarting up, stealing costuming ideas, new books, new art, new playmates, feeding my constant desperate need for novelty.  And time with my friends I never get to see otherwise.  That and the spark and flare.

4) If you went back to visit Europe again, where would you go?

London is always very very high on the list, but I think I'd like to see Berlin.  I do remember it, though spottily.  I'd need to brush up on my German.

5) What is the meaning of it all?

To love and be loved in return.  You thought I was going to say 42.  :)

For it is osprey_cat 's birthday!

In lieu of actual content, a resource question.

1) I am seeking hair sticks with a perfume pendant attached in some fashion. Preferably not real silver. I have bpal scents that don't work on my skin, and I want them to last longer anyway. Ideally I'd like to be able to pin up my hair and smell of, you know, Killdevil.

2) I am seeking a source for a Luftwaffe uniform in a larger size, custom if I can get it, that actually does not have the SS logos, and does not actually support Stormfront. Preferably.

I'm sure you're not interested in my uniform fetish, but it really is for a costume.

Yes, I did not make my 30 days. I'll still get to my questions, so don't worry, and next month I'll try again.

If there was one thing I could fix with my mental-interesting-ness, it would be the way when I want something, I obsess, endlessly and with greater and greater detail, over it. I cannot have this thing. I need to stop. I won't think of it, for days, for weeks, and then it is back. It will not be as I imagine it. Why can I not set it aside? *sigh*

Okay, I know I'm setting myself up by opening this up.


I am looking to increase my physical activity to improve my health.  It is not as simple as changing my diet-I have made some changes to good effect, and it would be tedious and extensive for me to relate my metabolic and dietary issues.  I killed the corn syrup in my diet and I'm making myself eat frequently and very small amounts-I have a horrible relationship with food, really.  I'm working on it.

I don't have the spare money or transport or time to get a gym membership, and the few times I've tried working out at regular gyms I've gotten stares like "What is something like YOU doing here" and so on, either they think girls can't/shouldn't lift weights, or that someone who is not already physically perfect shouldn't be at the gym. 

I tried to start working, but apparently started a bit too vigorously and screwed up my heel all up, and it's still giving me issues sometimes.  This is the problem I run into.  I want to improve my health, but with my balance issues, I'm limited in what I can make use of.  Even the most basic DVD's I've made use of, I can't keep up with.  :P  I am going to set down with the Bowflex stuff for 'so you're a slug, start here' stuff.  I would like to do the walking, but often with work I am not getting home until after or right at dark.  

You see part of the problem is very simply I cannot do the most common things.  I will wind up injured if I run.  I am intimidated like heck (yes even I can be intimidated) and it has kept me from trying.  The belly dancing classes went very well, and the asthma medications have made me able to not use my rescue inhaler for over a year at a time.  I want to do this, I just need to figure out how. 

You guys thought I wasn't gonna make it.  Happy birthday, holzman !  *hug*

Holy guacamole, I made it a week.

Okay, the main thing I play online is a zaftig tabby feline named Wyldekyttin.  Oddly enough.   These days too many people know me RL to play her ICly much, but she has some vague natural magic and tantric skill, and so on and so forth.  Sometimes she carries the cane I should carry.

She's been rewritten repeateedly.

In no particular order, I rarely play my boy on FM, an agressive mouthy little wolf top who often winds up on bottom.

On Taps I run a painfully shy little Catholic Siamese girl, two siblings, a brother and sister, both panthers, she's a dance student, he's an agressive sociopath who gets into a lot of interesting trouble, and one child character, someone's daughter, a little wolf girl.

Sorry I don't have any fancy stories, they do have backstories and all, if there's interest.

He means furry, again.

Furry has been on the edge of falling apart and being destroyed and aliens eating all of our brains and the zombies rising up and someone somewhere is laughing at us since back in '94 (oh dear) when I started getting involved with fandom.

I think it's about to flash over, like anime did, where there will be furry characters on lunch boxes and people will drag their gaggle of kids along and attempt to go into inappropriate areas and all that.  I think we're gaining more notice, and that's going to mean more press (who are not your friends) and an increasing likliness that someone at work is going to realize you're one of THOSE.

There's way more girls than there were.  There was a time when I could count all the girls I knew in fandom (physical girls, not just played them online, and that includes those who present as female so I treat them accordingly.) on one hand.  I could have people find me by simply stating that I was the female.  This has long since past.

Lots of us are growing up, and becoming crumudgeony, and shaking our heads at the stunts kids pull these days-which of course are much more stupid than the really stupid stunts we used to pull when we were their age.  They don't realize the damage of what they do, but we didn't either when we were young.  The problem with common sense is it isn't, and you're dealing with people with different cultural and social mores than you, and so you are inherently not going to be able to understand one another.  Try to give some of them a chance-some of the young'uns are pretty damn pleasant.  Some of the old 'uns are too.

I would really like to see someone run a convention for furry as a kink.  Make no claims for it to be a social thing, don't try to be 501c anything.  Run it like the other kink conventions, in private.  Let them have somewhere to have their voice and their chance to let their freak flag fly, because while there is overlap, and I doubt it's as much as people seem to think, then we'd at least have a place where the line can be drawn.  Well, that and I'm idly curious what sort of costuming'd happen-not that I'd hug the fur suits then either.

I think it's telling that every time someone tries to start a little hole in the wall convention they get 300 people showing up.  I think the weird wonderful wackiness and the general themes are shot through a number of existing fandoms (sci fi, anime, fantasy all have strong furry elements) and we are increasingly acknowedged at those cons with sigs and even tracks.  I think varioius attemps will rise or fall on the merits of those who are trying them.

This is another modified recipe.  Yes, I swear I will make real posts eventually, but work is eating my soul, and not nicely.

This has some sort of boring name like 'hot tomato hamburger casserole' but as osprey_cat dubbed it, it is now Lazy Tacos.

I'm halving what I did-I feed seven or more for most meals, so it's not quite necessary.

1 to 1 1/2 lb ground beef
1 small onion, chopped
1 can cream of chicken soup
1 10oz can of tomatoes and green chilies (Aldi's brand is 14.5, and worked fine)
4 cups of cheese, grated.  Coarsely is actually prefered
8oz of tortilla chips (don't use a weak, thin chip, or this will go to mush)

Brown the beef and cook the onion.  If you have any spare veggies and peppers, throw those in too, and make sure to season the beef, garlic, pepper, paprika, taco seasoning, whatever you have handy.  Drain the can of tomato and green chilies well, and in a bowl mix it well with the can of cream of chicken soup.  Smash the bag of chips-feel free to throw in any partial bags of other tortilla chips, more chips won't hurt it.  Preheat the oven for 350, and layer half the chips, then two cups of the cheese (two big hand fulls is 2 cups, if you want to guess.)   Spoon on the mixed tomatoes and soup-it's going to look gross.  Spoon the meat and veggies and onion out of the pan, draining well.  You don't want it to be greasy.  Two more hand fulls of cheese, and the rest of the chips, and then put it in the oven for 20 minutes.  You want to eat this right out of the oven, otherwise it sort of locks up into a giant block, which is kind of amusing too.  I served it with a can of black olives and sour cream to add if people wanted it.

I promise actual content Monday when I have time to sit in front of a computer.

The psudo English muffin one, dubbed 'Ren-Faire-English Muffins' 
The original recipe called for hot water and less flour-both are apparently because this is from a very old book, probably the 50's.  It doesn't have a copywright, Classic Home Cooking, for the American Action Fund for Blind Children and Adults

(I'm typing it with my mods already in it.)

6 cups flour
5 teaspoons of yeast (2 packets, about)
1/4 cup sugar
1 tbsp. salt
2 cups of warm water

Mix everything but the water and stir around for a bit until you can't see them seperately.  Add 2 cups of water, room temperature is fine, just not cold.  Either use a bread dough hook on a mixer or smish with your hands.  You'll get it under your nails.  ;)  Squish it around until it pulls together as a dough and isn't too sticky, it should pull away from the bowl and your hands when it's right.  Get out 2 big cookie sheets and line with parchment paper, and spray down with non stick spray or baker's friend (which has flour in it).  Pinch out enough to roll a 3 inch ball, and line them up, I got about 15 on a sheet.  Squash them to about 1/4 an inch thick.  I used the back of the 1/4 measuring cup with a bit of flour rubbed on it every 2 or so.  Cover them in a clean dish towel, and either set them in a cool oven with a bowl of water, or dampen the towels and leave them on the kitchen counter out of drafts.  Leave them alone for 45 minutes, minimum.  Preheat your oven to 425, bake them for 8 minutes, flip them, and then another 8 minutes.  Good luck letting them cool, I lost the first dozen before the second was done.  They're not exactly like english muffins, more like a cross between them and a hearty biscuit, they would be very well suited to breakfast sandwiches.

Yes, I'm skipping my subjects because it is late.  I made an experiment, an old cookbook had how to make english  muffins, but, welllll...

If you crossed one with a hearty biscuit, this might be how it'd work.

They didn't take long after I figured out they were smoking crack with the proportions.  It was very very sticky, with the dough, I'll post my modified version that turned out tomorrow, probably, since rissani insists cooking experiments make for good lj posts.

I'm reading a lot, mostly I am posting what on twitter.  I'm trying to read everything I own that I haven't read yet.   My book pile is almost comically high.

I need to mail my gun for the holster to be made, and I need to see if I can create another set of steam punk gear from what I have.

Does ANYONE have the time to assist a friend in modding a kimono pattern into steampunk?  I can even provide the sewing machine, I just need expertise and someone with time.  She can travel and can help with efforts and monies.  I just need someone who can produce in time for WIndyCon.

Okay guys, this was disjointed as a series of tweets.  :P  See ya tomorrow!

He means a furry.  My opinion has changed quite a bit over the years.

There is a community aspect to it, kind of like the difference between liking sci fi books and movies and attending cons.

If I describe someone else as a furry, in a usual sort of setting, it means they create or consume art or writing with the main point being animals with human characteristics AND/OR they dress up as such AND/OR they roleplay online as such, in various settings, usually mucks.

By my definitions.  Those are mine, I'm sure you have yours.  Doesn't make either of us right or wrong.

What it means, usually, is they've seen most of the disney movies involving talking animals.  They know who Omaha the Cat Dancer is.  (If they're old enough.)  They remember mucking at 2400 baud on a constantly lagging and crashing muck.  (If they're...you get the idea.)  They create vast areas no one notices, and then ignore all of it for a series of time with a character almost entirely pretend.  They care easily, they love easily.  They are generally less judgmental of physical and mental imperfection so long as the character projected is interesting.

They have been known to wear a tail and ears, or meow in response to a question, or bite in response to other things.

Yes, I know there's another way to take what it means to be a furry, and that's perfectly valid, but I'm not talking about my other kinks (mostly) in this post anyway.

So I didn't get a whole ton of suggestions on what to talk about, so I'm winging it-and breaking apart my one suggestion.

Write about furriness.

Hmmm, I could write about the relatively embarassing reasons I got into fandom.

I could talk about when I went mad, and how only furries stuck with me.

Or I could talk about other things I'm part of that are way, way, way weirder.

But instead I'm going to talk about fandom in so far as you get out of things what you put into them.

You will always be more emotionally vested in something that you put effort and time into than something you do not.

If you attend an event, and it has nothing that interests you, do not stomp your feet and pout and cross your arms and sulk and demand they entertain you.  (Unless you are in fact four.  Note:  This behavior is not attractive when you're four, either.)

Think the current events are stupid and immature or too expensive or not expensive enough or too far north or south or sideways?

Plan your own event.  Make your own interest groups.  Start an LJ group, or a twibe, or a mailing list, and see who else wants to share information about whatever the heck you like.  Just be aware if you're going to discuss left handed artistry and how not enough cons allow for lefties, you might wish to consider you will not get as many involved as, for instance, a group appreciating the kawk.

I don't draw, I don't (furry) costume after I was so vigorously snubbed on the subject, I don't write (furry stuff), so I am applying what I am good at-organizing and administrating-to give back to a group that I get something from.  Do I love every furry because they are furry?  Goodness no. There are quite a few I wouldn't leave my purse near, and if one of my housemates were dating them I'd be concerned about their mental health.  They don't have to be my bestest friend because hey, they're a furry too!  And they don't have to be mine.  I'll often give them a chance to communicate with me, though, and if things don't work, I'll drop it.

I am always amused by how a group that can so easily be spit on is so quick to spit on other subgroups within the same fandom.  Women are ruining fandom.  Kinksters are ruining fandom.  Lifestylers are ruining fandom.  Pagans are ruining fandom.

Apparently some of these people need a history lesson on who started the fandom.

I'm not saying you have to like and support everyone else.  This isn't the second grade and you don't have to bring a valentine for everyone so that no one is left out.  My lack of a fur suit does not mean I'm not 'really' a furry.  That guy just being in it for the art does not make him not a furry.  And if someone wants to be a fan and fur suit and have a spiritual connection to an animal, and say he's not furry?  Sure, self identification is important.  Just be aware that if I don't know you identify as a therian, I'm very likely going to be lazy and when I'm explaining you to someone else say you're a furry.  Because to me?  That just means that you have an excessive affection for art or writing involving people with teefs and claws and tails.  *shrug*

For October I'm going to attempt to post every day of the month of October.  It is my favorite month, after all, and I'm trying to get into the habit of posting and not really wanting to just set my twitters to post.  (If people want to read my twitters, they would add my twitter.)

So comments are screened, and I won't unscreen them unless you say I can set it public-is there something you always wanted to know?  A story I should tell?  A subject I should riff on?  I'll try to make most of them public or friend's locked.

Is apple picking as recreation one of those tricking someone into white washing your fence thing, or is it actually fun?

Okay, so we're buying tickets for 4pm for the Harry Potter exhibit on Sunday, and we're looking at going to the museum, then the exhibit at 4.  It's around 30 bucks for the tickets for both things.  I would like it if people would come with!

https://t1.clicknprint.com/tix/MSI?eventid=17578

Just get them for 4pm on Sunday, and we can pick them up on site-that works up until the day of, when you'll need to buy tickets on site.

Thus far we're buying tickets for me, unclevlad , and queenmab100 .  Let us know who else to hook up with!

I'm going to quickly throw up a link of our issues we've been having at the Luxor.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/35678504@N06/sets/72157621888022174/

Now some of this is pretty gosh darn cool, the angle-y room, the Egyptian theme, but additionally many items are in very poor repair, there's no trash can in the bathroom, the bathroom door sticks constantly, the other tv doesn't work, the lamp has no switch, really guys?  I'm not comming here again.  :P  They claim someone is going to come discuss it with us, but had they bothered to do so in a timely fashion, I'd not have had time to post, right?  Sleeping in a giant black pyramid with a red moon should be kewler than this.

Well, I'll probably be tweeting it.

Anyone want anything from Vegas?  I'll be there through Monday, starting tonight.

Anyone wanna hook up?  Anything I must see?

Happy birthday, amberinside

Many happy returns!

Oh yeah, I have more than a twitter account!

So since August is rapidly booking up, a couple of proposed events.

I am tentatively proposing a trip to the Museum of Science and Industry for August 23rd.  I am aiming for the Harry Potter tickets around...4.  We will be haunting the rest of the museum until then  This is a SUNDAY.

www.msichicago.org AND http://www.harrypotterexhibition.com/ WHICH WAS TOTES THERE THE WHOLE TIME.

Further, I propose we attend http://www.chicagolandbrowncoats.com/merchandise/ the Serenity screening with Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog.  It's the 29th, likely at 6pm, you can buy tickets there.  Costume contest, prizes, so on.

Ideally, I'd like comments in the format of:

Yes, I'd like to go with you to (either, both) and I will buy my own ticket/please pick me up at ticket, I'm bringing my spouse/dog/fuck buddy/ferret.

OR!  Hey stupid, you're scheduling against (arbitrary important other event I'm not thinking of)!

It would be especially helpful to hear from household members and locals.  Though heck, I'll host if someone'd like to visitate.

(Yes, I edited.)