a) Yuki-onna talks about deodorant, which turns into an amazing rant about gender stereotypes. Make sure to expand the comments on the first page; there's some awesome discussion going on.
b) Fantastic burlesque music, free of charge. You can listen for nothing, or pay to download.
c) A great reference for anyone interested in 19th century and Civil War slang.
2. I am finished one of my school courses. Really finished. The I'm taking my textbooks back on Wednesday sort of finished. That leaves:
a) Math (0% complete)
b) AP Literature (approx 75% complete)
c) Work Experience (no schoolwork required)
On the non-school side of things, I am currently studying tarot, horary astrology (as in, the classical "scientific" astrology of the 1600's, before Alan Leo fucked it up and turned it into a scam), alchemy, comparative mythology, the decan system, Golden Dawn colour theory, etc, ad infinitum. Brain so full. Interestingly, I'm not researching these things to use them, with the exception of tarot (i.e., am not researching horary to read my horoscope). but rather their history, how they relate to each other, and what influence they had on how 17th century people thought. It all comes back to history or literature, here.
3. Books I picked up recently:
- Serbian Fairy Tales [1921].
- The Idiot's Guide to Alchemy (Dennis William Hauck), which is clear and brilliant and down to earth. Written by a certified alchemist who was trained by one of the last traditional Italian philosopher-scientists.
- Europe: A History (Norman Davies), which is heavily lauded as the best specific history text ever written. If I ever wanted a book weighty and deep enough to be considered the Bible of European History, this is the one. Were you so inclined, you could instruct the masses and then murder them, with this 1390 page brick.
- The Hero With A Thousand Faces (Joseph Campbell), which is pretty much standard fare these days if you're studying mythology. I haven't read much Campbell, and I need to rectify this egregious error.
- Thunderstruck (Erik Larson), non-fiction, about the history of the wireless. Like one of his other books, The Devil in the White City, he ties an event that, at the time, was considered loony but is now a pivotal part of history or science or what have you, and also tells the history of a killer who was active in the same time and area. (Devil was about the Chicago World's Fair and serial killer H.H. Holmes, respectively. Highly recommended.)
- The Chemical Theatre (Charles Nicholl), which is a study of alchemical imagery in Shakespeare, and is so far a most excellent text. (I told you it all comes back to history or literature.)
- The Chemical Theatre. See above.
- The Idiot's Guide to Alchemy. Ditto.
- Understanding the Thoth Tarot by Lon Milo Duquette. If you, like me, would rather chew glass than try to puzzle through Crowley's Book of Thoth unaided, this is the text for you.
- Drawing Down the Moon by Margot Adler. Good, solid pagan scholarship. I read it every couple of years.
- Finnegan's Wake by Joyce. (Hey, I said I was reading it, not that I was comprehending it. Although, shockingly, that is coming.)
Hence, via blogging, I have revealed yet another of my pet peeves. Take care when mentioning Islamic scholarship around me, because I have the tendency to balrog all over the place about ignorant Eurocentricity and historical sinkholes. Ye be warned.
4. I need to push myself back into the writing river, and the best way to do that is with a short story. Hence, I'm taking votes. The choices are...
a) The story begun here, about the widower lord, his haunted house, and the journalist who turns his world upside down;
b) The story begun here, about aliens and friendship in a world gone wrong;
c) Hilane's story, involving Drow, a realistic kick-butt female protagonist, and political intrigue;
d) A recently-spawned story about an intersex character who grows up in a ballroom community (not what it sounds like, seriously -- click the link) with a bit of a magical twist;
e) And, last but not least, a story which I can only summarize using the first line: "Thrice are we sinners. We are siblings, which is outlawed; we are women, which is abhorrent; we are atheist, which is heresy. And if they discover us, we shall die for it." Half sisters, forbidden love, a harem in Morocco, and Existentialism.
For those interested, Hilane's story is one of two that doesn't barf homosexuality all over the place (although it is referred to), and B doesn't really talk about it even though it occurs. D probably has the most flagrant queer theme (obviously) and A is close behind, if not as varied. E implies a lot more than it shows, in the vein of Maurice and other such Victorian works infected with teh gay.
If asked, I would say my favorites out of the five are the first one and the last one, but we'll see what people vote for (if anything). Whichever story I end up writing will be shared on Pixel-Stained Technopeasant Day, in April.
5. Happy Observed 446th Birthday, Christopher Marlowe! (I'm two days late, but since it's "birthday, implied," I have a little leeway.)
This is an appropriate time to dispel the biggest myth about Marlowe -- he wasn't gay. Well, yes, he had sex with men. However, in Elizabethan times, homosexual activity was a kink, not an orientation. No one called themselves "homosexual" in Shakespeare's day -- they were classified as tribades or sodomites or sapphists or what have you, but it was a practice, not an identity. (Relatedly, to bust another urban myth, there was no such thing as an Elizabethan "molly house," not to mention the fact that the term "molly" didn't arise until the mid-1700's. Ditto for "homosexual," which was coined in -- correct me if I'm wrong -- the 1860's.)
The more you know!
6. I have a Sekrit Projekt in the works. Whether it'll get finished soon (or ever) is up in the air, but I'm having fun with the process -- which admittedly is so far thought-based only because I'm waiting for a big piece of the project to arrive in the mail. However, if I mention that it involves Lovecraft, felt pens, and a big helping of Silly, maybe I can get my readers to constantly koosh me about getting it done.
