deense

I'm not an asking person. I'm a giving person. I love to send gifts to people and I hate to ask for them. But this is very special to me, so I'm overcoming my misgivings and I'm asking for your help.

There's a Stargate Convention here in March that I desperately want to go to. Details are here. (Richard Dean Anderson! First time in Sydney!!)

I would dearly love the $950 ticket, and there's no way I can afford it. However, as a combined Christmas/birthday gift I'd like to make a suggestion: donate $9.50 to my StargateCon fund.

I love that people want to buy me gifts, and I have always appreciated them. But this year, if you want to buy me a gift, I would love it if you would help me go to this convention.

If you can't or don't want to, I completely understand. But if you do I will always be appreciative.

And hey, a photo of me with Richard Dean Anderson!!

Holy crap guys. I'm at $554.12 already! Which leaves 395.88 to go. But OMG awesome and thank you!

Twenty years ago today a gunman entered the École Polytechnique in Montreal. He shot 28 people and killed 14 female engineering students, simply because they were female.

He began his attack by entering a classroom at the university, where he separated the male and female students. After claiming that he was "fighting feminism", he shot all nine women in the room, killing six. He then moved through corridors, the cafeteria, and another classroom, specifically targeting women to shoot. He killed fourteen women and injured four men and ten women in just under twenty minutes before turning the gun on himself.

* Geneviève Bergeron (born 1968), civil engineering student
* Hélène Colgan (born 1966), mechanical engineering student
* Nathalie Croteau (born 1966), mechanical engineering student
* Barbara Daigneault (born 1967), mechanical engineering student
* Anne-Marie Edward (born 1968), chemical engineering student
* Maud Haviernick (born 1960), materials engineering student
* Maryse Laganière (born 1964), budget clerk in the École Polytechnique's finance department
* Maryse Leclair (born 1966), materials engineering student
* Anne-Marie Lemay (born 1967), mechanical engineering student
* Sonia Pelletier (born 1961), mechanical engineering student
* Michèle Richard (born 1968), materials engineering student
* Annie St-Arneault (born 1966), mechanical engineering student
* Annie Turcotte (born 1969), materials engineering student
* Barbara Klucznik-Widajewicz (born 1958), nursing student


Twenty years and it was still a tragedy. We've come so far and events like this remind us of how much further we have to go.

I was in high school when it happened. I remember thinking that it was horrible and that every woman should have the right to be what they wanted.

They shouldn't be forgotten.

Something hit me recently. Which is that the Guild and Merlin both need to be added to my repetoire. Which means that Glinda and Kitty get bumped to the end of the year, but pffft. THESE COSTUMES ROCK.

Also? I need to make everyone for the guild video do you want to date my avatar
Cyd (aka Felicia, aka the white and red) = me Only cause if Im making a corset, it isn't for anyone else
Vork (aka the guy in green) = Karl(Melbourne)/Brenden (Sydney)
Clara (aka teal) = Ishie (melbourne)/Nadene (Sydney)
Tinkerbella (purple) = Kazzia
Zaboo = Mikey/Guy Brenden knows
Whilst I have no one to play Bladezz I feel it should be Kevin. Also, I think there needs to be a half dozen girls in the silver back up outfits.

Half will be out at Supanova, half at Armageddon. My dream is to get them all together.

As to the Morgana? I just want to make those dresses. So they boot out Glinda. Sigh. <333

Hullo Yuletide Penguin!

( dear yuletide penguin )

Part of the gold pass was getting signed photos from the people there. I had gotten Paul's right before Joe's panel, and went to get Joe's right after.

Joe looked at Paul's in my hand, said 'can I see that' and grabbed it, adding something to it.

So I went back to Paul and he added something to Joe's.

( pictures under here )

Boys. All I'm saying.

I wrote something to a friend tonight, and realised it could be applied to so many people on my list who are stressing and worrying right now. So I thought I'd share, with a couple of changes. Because it is something I believe about everyone on my list, honestly.


You're a brilliant person, truly you are. You believe so much in people, and are so positive about things no matter what, I wish that transferred back to yourself. I know better than to truly expect that, it's a thing, isn't it? Seeing greatness in others and not expecting it in ourselves.

The road ahead is hard. It will be a long slog. You will make choices you later regret. You will do things you question, and that you look back on and wonder if you'd just done them differently, how will they turn out.

But you will also do brilliant things. You will write things you look back on later and are in awe of. That we are all in awe of. You will say and do things that are mediocre, yes, but we all do. You will also shine. I know that. Somewhere, here, I know that.

Not every day will have us shine like stars. Not every moment will fulfill our dreams. It's part of the adjustment we make as we transition through life. Not into adulthood, fuck that noise. I'm an adult and still transistioning. But times will come that you see yourself as so much more. That you do something outstanding and brilliant and generous. That you find yourself surrounded by those you love and realise that your life - while perhaps not the one you dreamed of once - is better than the one you feared you might have.

I adore you, and I know what it's like to not be satisfied and to doubt. But you are talented. You are brilliant.

We are as much our crises as we are our accomplishments. It is difficult to accept that. I know I still struggle with it. But without doubting ourselves and questioning, what would we be?

Know that I love you

Well, enough of you asked, that I thought I would write it up.

The Lady Katherine (Katje) Bouland of Lancater (Botanical Alchemist)

My father grew up on a small estate outside of Lancaster. The youngest son of a family with little money but a great deal of prestige and history, he took a post with the British Imperial Tea Company in India. He was able to marry for love, a woman younger than him, and they moved there shortly after my birth.

Living in north-west India, my father oversaw a chain of plantations. He flourished in the country, but sadly his wife did not. Two stillbirths took their toll on my mother, and she died not long after the birth of my brother, my only living sibling.

Raised mostly by our Amah, my brother and I had the run of the plantation. From a young age we explored, and listened to the stories of the plantation workers. My brother looked to the skies, and not long after finishing his school he enlisted in Her Majesty's Royal Airship Service. He quickly made Captain, a fact that thrilled my father to no end.

I, however, looked to the jungles. Long had there been stories of a concoction that the natives claimed would prolong life and bestow good health on those who discovered the secret of its making. The plants one needed to make this were rare and reputedly deep in amongst the trees and vines. I would venture as far as I could, taking careful notes and making cuttings of any plants I came to find. I knew one day I would discover this secret.

Sadly, disease struck the Empire, hitting at it's heart in England. My grandfather and uncle died, leaving my father their title. He became a Lord, and overnight our fortunes changed. Suddenly we received invitations to parties in Bombay and throughout Her Majesty's Indian lands. I had never had much time for society, and railed against being dragged to such events. It seemed that the men there only wished to have me be pretty, a jewel to add to their collection. My father, knowing how he aged and wishing me to be protected and cared for, wanted me to marry. I disliked this notion, knowing I could truly care for myself. I seemed to have little say in it. Moreso, this being flaunted about like a pretty package took time from my work and studies.

Things changed again when my brother bought scandal to the family. He arrived at one such function in his Captains uniform with an Indian woman on his arm. Not only that, he had taken her to be his wife! My father was incensed, casting him out of the family. It hurt him desperately, and his health declined so rapidly after that. Many arguments came of this. My brother had been no angel in his youth, carousing and gambling as boys are wont to do, or so I had been told. But for all that we had lived among the Indian people so long, my father could never see them as equals, or worthy of our family name, and now title. In the end, we spoke no more of it, and I continued to see my brother and his wife discreetly, giving them help when I could.

Even more intent on my marriage, as I would gain his title now, I acquiesced to marry a friend of his. He was much younger than my father, though many years my senior, and I had known him for many years. Unlike the puffed-up peacocks I met through society, he treated me as an intellectual equal. Our marriage was more one of convenience -- he an inventor, wished someone to be his companion, and would leave me to my own studies.

We decided, shortly after my father's death two years later, to travel to newer lands. My brother's disobedience had eaten at him and he had never been the same, for all that he was promoted again and again in the Airship Service. Impending war with the Kaiser meant able men were rewarded, scandal in their lives or not.

My husband wished to leave that behind us, and to meet with some intellectuals interested in his field of research - mastering time itself! Myself, I had heard similar legends of a botanical philosopher's stone, if you will, which existed amongst the natives of Her Majesty's lands in Australia. Because of this we booked tickets on one of the first long distance air-ships between India and Australia. Oh, how exciting to start a new life and new research. I admit to being thrilled.

/Finis

There's an article going around about the 'Gay Twist on Sherlock Holmes' and while it earned a giggle from me at first, something has been bothering me about it all day¹.

I quote:

...Michael Medved, a former Post movie critic, says Downey and Law must be joking. "There's not a seething, bubbling hunger to see straight stars impersonating homosexuals," Medved told us. "I think they're just trying to generate controversy . . . They know that making Holmes and Watson homosexual will take away two-thirds of their box office. Who is going to want to see Downey Jr. and Law make out? I don't think it would be appealing to women. Straight men don't want to see it."

I'm not sure where to start with this. There's the fangirl reaction which involves a lot of squealing and thinking that man, that's hot. Then there's being offended at the pigeonholing of female sexuality that happened so easily there. Woman must not like that sort of thing? Has anyone noticed how many straight (and actually, not-so-straight) women are very very intrigued by things like Adam Lambert's hips, or homo-erotic fiction? Or the proliferation of things like slash-fiction on the internet.

But wait for a moment. Let us take this out of the realms of fandom, and fic. How about the fact that bastions of supposedly straight and conservative women like Young and the Restless have featured storylines involving gay teens dating and *gasp* kissing, earning the show some of it's highest rating in a very long time. It was more about the relationship than the simple appeal, but those two boys being attractive wasn't a detriment. Things like this are apparently also forgotten.

Moving on from there, is the unspoken assumption that it's going to somehow be some sort of orgy filled snogfest. That the story won't be interesting or compelling enough that any homo-eroticism in their relationship, overt or covert, would be the focus. It's Sherlock Bloody Holmes, for god's sake, and Guy Ritchie. I mean, I was already going to give it a go.

Then is the assertion that the actors and director mistakenly think there's some sort of clamoring to see straight stars impersonating homosexuals. Whilst I won't even touch on fandom here, I will say that isn't that part of what acting is about? Being something that you aren't to tell a story? Every day people pretend to be straight or gay, victim or bully, jewish or christian, when their own lives might not reflect this at all. The studio and director made the choice to go for two big name actors. If they'd wanted Sherlock to wear an eyepatch, speak in a norweigan accent and hop around on one leg all whilst bemoaning his traumatic childhood, RDJ would have.

There doesn't need to be a seething, bubbling hunger, there simply needs to be a way to make it fit in with the story Ritchie is trying to tell. I would have said there wasn't a seething, bubbling hunger to see a show about polygamists either, but look at Big Love, and how successful its been for HBO.

There is some baffling about the statement that 'They know that making Holmes and Watson homosexual will take away two-thirds of their box office'. Do they really? All straight men will forgo seeing this? That's a fairly broad, homophobic and sexist assumption. Do those straight men also wear anti-gay wards, to keep away those pesky gay germs that might infect them? What about gay men and women? Are they considered? Or the straight woman that do want to see them make out, or even don't care one way or another?

Finally, it's a bit insulting to those of us who actually want to see the movie because it looks, if nothing else, intriguing. Those of us that like or love Sherlock Holmes and are curious about this re-imagining. Yes, some of us are maybe preparing to be horrified, but it's there. The people who are Guy Ritchie fans, or Law and RDJ fans, and would doubtless go to see any movie they were in (please remember, I have Heart and Souls on my computer. Don't judge me, I beg of you). Or those who simply want to see one of the highly touted movies of next year, and don't care one way or the other as to the romantic inclinations of two men.

I do wonder about quotes like that. I realise they are in part ot stir up controversy, and in that they succeed. But I wonder how any sane person can make such a statement, and on the record.

¹ No, it's not the differentiation between gay and homo-erotic, that's a rant left for birkentree to make

Festival, Friday
Berengar and Theuderic before court


War day and court (Sunday)


Bethan at the beginning of her laurel ceremony


Monday - Fighter Auction
Lily watching the tourney