Whit's LiveJournal

Ask and ye shall receive...

Fri, 23 Dec 2005 21:27:35 GMT

http://japanimatedfastshow.homestead.com/Fanfics.html

Some Bush/Cheney slash... well, so, okay, no Bush/Cheney yet, but there's Cheney and everyone else. Now I must go bleach my eyeballs, thank you very much!

Fri, 23 Dec 2005 21:04:44 GMT

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. officials have secretly monitored radiation levels at Muslim sites, including mosques and private homes, since September 11, 2001 as part of a top secret program searching for nuclear bombs, U.S. News and World Report said on Friday.

The news magazine said in its online edition that the far-reaching program covered more than a hundred sites in the Washington, D.C., area and at least five other cities.

"In numerous cases, the monitoring required investigators to go on to the property under surveillance, although no search warrants or court orders were ever obtained, according to those with knowledge of the program," the magazine said.

The report comes a week after revelations that the Bush administration had authorized eavesdropping on people in the United States. U.S. President George W. Bush has defended that covert program and vowed to continue the practice, saying it was vital to protect the country.

Senior U.S. officials, including FBI Director Robert Mueller, have repeatedly said Islamic militants appeared intent on acquiring weapons of mass destruction for an attack against the United States.

Mueller said in February he was "very concerned with the growing body of sensitive reporting that continues to show al Qaeda's clear intention to obtain and ultimately use some form of chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear or high-energy explosives material in its attacks against America."

An FBI spokesman declined to confirm or deny the U.S. News and World Report article and said, "We can't talk about a classified program."

"The FBI's overriding priority is to prevent, disrupt and defeat terrorist operations in the U.S. All investigations and operations conducted by the FBI are intelligence driven and predicated on specific information about potential criminal acts or terrorist threats, and are conducted in strict conformance with federal law," he added.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations advocacy group said the report, coupled with news of the domestic eavesdropping, "could lead to the perception that we are no longer a nation ruled by law, but instead one in which fear trumps constitutional rights."

"All Americans should be concerned about the apparent trend toward a two-tiered system of justice, with full rights for most citizens, and another diminished set of rights for Muslims," it said in a statement.

Federal officials cited by U.S. News and World Report maintained the program was legal and said warrants were not needed for the kind of radiation sampling it conducted. Officials also rejected any notion that the program specifically targeted Muslims, the magazine said.

According to U.S. News and World Report, the nuclear surveillance program began in early 2002 and has been run by the FBI and the Department of Energy's Nuclear Emergency Support Team.

At its peak, the effort involved three vehicles in the Washington area monitoring 120 sites a day, nearly all of them Muslim targets such as prominent mosques and office buildings selected by the FBI, it said.

The program has also operated in at least five other cities -- namely Chicago, Detroit, Las Vegas, New York, and Seattle -- when threat levels there have risen, it said.

One source quoted by the magazine said the targets were almost all U.S. citizens.

Vice President Dick Cheney was among those briefed on the monitoring program, the publication said.

We should all do our civic duty...

Fri, 23 Dec 2005 20:56:11 GMT

Just a crazy thought here... but I think we should all do our civic duty here. ANd start writing some slashfic.

Bush/Cheney slashfic, to be exact.

Salt in lots of forbidden language you know will be on the NSA's alert list, like "let's blow shit up!" and "Osama is my man."

Send it to everyone you know and adore overseas. And get them to email it right on back.

Fri, 23 Dec 2005 20:43:14 GMT

Wiretaps said to sift all overseas contacts

The Boston Globe
By Charlie Savage, Globe Staff | December 23, 2005

WASHINGTON -- The National Security Agency, in carrying out President Bush's order to intercept the international phone calls and e-mails of Americans suspected of links to Al Qaeda, has probably been using computers to monitor all other Americans' international communications as well, according to specialists familiar with the workings of the NSA.

The Bush administration and the NSA have declined to provide details about the program the president authorized in 2001, but specialists said the agency serves as a vast data collection and sorting operation. It captures reams of data from satellites, fiberoptic lines, and Internet switching stations, and then uses a computer to check for names, numbers, and words that have been identified as suspicious.

''The whole idea of the NSA is intercepting huge streams of communications, taking in 2 million pieces of communications an hour," said James Bamford, the author of two books on the NSA, who was the first to reveal the inner workings of the secret agency.

''They have a capacity to listen to every overseas phone call," said Tom Blanton, director of the National Security Archive at George Washington University, which has obtained documents about the NSA using Freedom of Information Act requests.

The NSA's system of monitoring e-mails and phone calls to check for search terms has been used for decades overseas, where the Constitution's prohibition on unreasonable searches does not apply, declassified records have shown.

But since Bush's order in 2001, Bamford and other specialists said, the same process has probably been used to sort through international messages to and from the United States, though humans have never seen the vast majority of the data.

''The collection of this data by automated means creates new privacy risks," said Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, a watchdog group that has studied computer-filtered surveillance technology through Freedom of Information Act lawsuits.

Among the risks, he said, is that the spy agency's computers will collect personal information that has no bearing on national security, and that intelligence agents programming those computers will be tempted to abuse their power to eavesdrop for personal or political gain.

But even when no personal information intercepted by the NSA's computers make it to human eyes and ears, Rotenberg said, the mere fact that spy computers are monitoring the calls and e-mails may also violate the Fourth Amendment. The Supreme Court has never ruled on whether automated surveillance of phone calls and e-mails, without a warrant, is constitutional.

The closest comparisons, legal specialists said, are cases challenging the use of dogs and infrared detectors to look for drugs without a warrant. The Supreme Court approved the use of drug-sniffing dogs to examine luggage in an airport, but said police could not use infrared scanners to check houses for heat patterns that could signal an illegal drug operation.

''This is very much a developing field, and a lot of the law is not clear," said Harvard Law School professor Bill Stuntz.

President Bush and his aides have refused to answer questions about the domestic spying program, other than to insist that it was legal. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales this week said the program only targeted messages ''where we have a reasonable basis to conclude" that one of the parties is affiliated with Al Qaeda.

And some legal scholars have maintained that a computer cannot violate other Americans' Fourth Amendment rights simply by sorting through their messages, as long as no human being ever looks at them.

Alane Kochems, a lawyer and a national security analyst at the conservative Heritage Foundation, said, ''I don't think your privacy is violated when you have a computer doing it as opposed to a human. It isn't a sentient being. It's a machine running a program."

But Yale Law School professor Jack Balkin said that Fourth Amendment privacy rights can still be violated without human contact if the NSA stores copies of everyone's messages, raising the possibility that a human could access them later. The administration has not revealed how long the NSA stores messages, and the agency has refused to comment on the program.

Balkin added that as technology becomes ever more sophisticated, any legal distinction between human agents and their tools is losing meaning. Under the theory that only human beings can invade people's privacy, he said, the police ''could simply use robots to do their dirty work."

In 1978, following revelations that President Nixon had used the NSA to spy on his domestic enemies, Congress enacted a law making it illegal to wiretap a US citizen without permission from a secret national security court. The court requires the government to show evidence that the target is a suspected spy or terrorist.

Under the 1978 law, NSA officials have had to obtain a warrant from the secret court before putting an American's information into their computers' search terms.

The restrictions largely limited NSA to collecting messages from overseas communications networks, but some Americans' messages were intercepted before the 2001 terrorist attacks.

Occasionally, the interception was deliberate. In April 2000, the NSA's then-director, General Michael Hayden, told Congress that since 1978 ''there have been no more than a very few instances of NSA seeking [court] authorization to target a US person in the United States."

More often, the interception was accidental. Because American international calls travel through foreign networks, some of which are monitored by the NSA, the agency's computers have sifted through some American international messages all along.

''Long before 9/11, the NSA gathered from the ether mountains of [overseas] phone calls and e-mail messages on a daily basis," said Columbia Law School professor Deborah Livingston. ''If you have such an extensive foreign operation, you'll gather a large amount of phone traffic and e-mails involving Americans. That's something we've lived with for a long time."

But Bush's order cleared the way for the NSA computers to sift through Americans' phone calls and e-mails.

According to a New York Times report last week, Bush authorized the NSA's human analysts to look at the international messages of up to 500 Americans at a time, with a changing list of targets.

Hayden, now the deputy director of national intelligence, told reporters this week that under Bush's order, a ''shift supervisor" instead of a judge signs off on deciding whether or not to search for an American's messages.

The general conceded that without the burden of obtaining warrants, the NSA has used ''a quicker trigger" and ''a subtly softer trigger" when deciding to track someone.

Bamford said that Hayden's ''subtly softer trigger" probably means that the NSA is monitoring a wider circle of contacts around suspects than what a judge would approve.
© Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company

Why aren't more conservatives outraged and fightin' mad about this? It just boggles my mind...

Thu, 22 Dec 2005 18:18:00 GMT

Here's a Firefly fic for agentotter. I think of this every time I see her "I am weary" LJ Icon. We must share a kink or two. ;)

FIREFLY FIC: Brumbies
Author: bbikitten
Timeline/Spoilers: during events of “Out of Gas”
Summary: as he waits alone on the ship, Mal dreams of wild horses, and of freedom threatened.
The good ship Serenity are her crew © Joss Whedon. Joss, you bastard!
Deadwood and her inhabitants © David Milch & HBO
“Dove & Waterline” lyrics by Jeffrey Foucault

~ ~ ~ ~

The stars all have names
And the angels have the same
But I'm lost and I so much want
To be found

~ ~ ~ ~

… He dreamed of horses, herds of them, flights of them, rolling multi-colored masses of them that spilled across the valley like stars across a velvet sky. The rumble of their hooves brought up clouds of dust, and made the ground itself shake…

… woke again, only to find the bridge around him dark and cold. The ship was hollow. A man had learned to live with the constant sound of Serenity's turning engine like he did the beat of his own heart, and now that everything was still and silent, he might hold his breath and strain for proof of the pulse still in his veins…

Serenity continued to drift. Mal pulled the blankets tighter around himself and closed his eyes again, hoping to dream.

… indefinite nowhere, and then sunlight and horses again. Brumbies, hundreds of them, in all shades and sizes, flowing across the valley like a congregation’s prayers. The valley was familiar to him; it was the old Mwolo-Stanard homestead, there along the bottomland of Crackbone Creek where the water flowed year-around. Mal found himself standing on the northern slope of Mercher’s Butte, looking down into that valley which he remembered from his boyhood as a seasonal green or gold, and which he knew from manhood had been blasted into glass by Alliance gunships during the war years. He turned his face to the sun, relishing the warmth and the light of his own homeworld, and let the good, clean air fill his lungs.

Horses running. Wild horses in flight. Their numbers seemed endless. Mal looked down upon the valley again, and found in that dislocated way of dreaming that he was a-horse. Rawhide’s head came up with a snort and a pull at the reins, and the pair of dark-tipped ears swung forward with interest. Old Rawhide had been born wild himself, and the sudden tension in the gelding’s stocky body meant that the horse hadn’t forgotten it.

Horses never did forget. Move a fenceline or cut down a tree -- a horse would remember those details of a landscape, long after a man forgot. You could desensitize a horse, so that he didn’t balk at a ditch where maybe once a snake had struck at his hooves. But just because he didn’t shy up didn’t mean he wasn’t looking closely for that snake, even twenty-some years after the snake had made a contribution to the stew pot.

Men forgot. Men forgot too easily, especially those small, sweet portions of memory which could nourish. Mal hadn’t thought of Rawhide for years. Rawhide had been a short-coupled little bucksin gelding, hardly more than a pony in size. Mal had ridden many of the ranch’s other horses, but the gelding been Mal’s closest companion for many years, as his mother and her ranch hands had trusted him to old Rawhide’s keeping. The gelding had been a good sight steadier in temperament than his young rider had been, and had communicated his moods when necessary through a bucktrot so brutal it could drive the family jewels back up into a boy’s belly for refuge. Old Rawhide had kept a lonely boy friends through many turns of a world, and had taught him as much as any fancy wordsmith tutor.

Mal reached out to slap the dusty yellow neck, then ran his fingers through the bristling mane. He’d forgotten the tang of horse sweat, and the short, coarse feel of a roach-cut mane. The saddle leather beneath him creaked, and he felt the easy expansion of Rawhide’s ribs between his knees. The horse snorted and shook his head, pulling again at the reins. Mal felt the shift of the horse’s weight forward, that silent yearning to join the wild herd in flight.

He gave old Rawhide the rein the dun wanted, and let his own weight shift, so that when the gelding lunged forward, he was ready for the movement. Two strides, then three – and then Rawhide was sailing down hill, swallowing the ground as he chased after the brumbies.

It was exhilarating to ride like this, flat out and hell for leather. Mal-the-Boy had thought there could be nothing better; Mal-the-Man would wager good sex with a good woman could trump it, but it wouldn’t be a given. Rawhide’s stride was long and easy; the old horse has lungs like iron, and even at a pace like this, it would be miles before he began to lather. They gained on the wild herd with an ease that seemed effortless, as nothing in the real world ever could prove so true.

Mal sat straight in the saddle, reins in one hand, rein-ends hanging from the other. The wind rushed over him; if he had been wearing a hat, he might well have lost it. They were coming down on the creek bottom, where the footing might get boggy. Mal shifted weight in the saddle, and Rawhide slowed in response. Three strides, and then there was the rambling creek right before them. Mal felt the gelding gather himself; he braced for a jump, and then the buckskin was airborne and sailing over the stream. The gelding’s landing was sure-footed as a cat’s. Two strides, and they were galloping again, drawing closer on the herd with every breath. This was freedom. This was independence. To ride free, to soar across a landscape he knew and loved, with the power and liberty of a good horse beneath him and the sun smiling fair upon them -- this was what he had volunteered for service to protect, and what had sustained him when his boyish notions of heroics had met ugly reality on the front lines of the war. Mal was free, with only his own will and the responsibilities to home and hearth to dictate to him. He gave Rawhide a pop with the rein-ends, and the buckskin surged forward with fresh speed, his whole body moving with easy healthy and strength.

As always, something good couldn’t last, not even in the refuge of his dreams. Mal was riding up hard on the herd’s flank before he realized what he was there for. Rawhide was still gaining ground, passing by the foal-heavy mares, heading to get forward of the surging press and turn them. There would be pens waiting down the valley, where the hillsides came in steep and sudden. There would be pens waiting, and trucks, even some larger hovertrans.

Because, after all, wild horses were like all other vermin. Horses went feral, and just like cats, dogs and pigs, they would breed and multiply until there was nothing left for them to consume. Man had brought these creatures from Earth-that-Was, and Man had to keep them in check. So every few years, when the wild horses grew too many and began to eat the land ragged, it was time to round them up. Chase the herds for days from air, then channel them into pens. Cull out the best of the young and healthy to train up as saddle stock, and sell the rest to the same feedlots as bought up calves for table and market. A few wild horses always were contrary and managed an escape; give ‘m a handful of years, and soon there’d be too many brumbies again.

The joyous thrill of the chase was suddenly dry and bitter with dust. He knew what was awaiting these free creatures. Pursuit. Capture. A processing line through the squeeze chute, or to be roped and dragged down for the burn of the white-hot brand. The feedlot for some, a rifle bullet for others; only a very few would survive, and for those that did, it meant a subjugation to bridle and bit.

He wanted no part of this. Mal reined his horse in, but Rawhide had the bit in his teeth and no amount of sawing on the reins would bring the gelding in. Mal shouted and sat his weight back in the saddle, dragging at the bit, throwing his whole body and strength into curbing the beast, but his mount had a mind of its own and would not stop. Abruptly, Mal heard the flat crack of a rifle, and a painted mare alongside them dropped. Another shot, and this time a young colt went down, screaming in agony.

A third shot, and this one hammered into Mal’s own side. The force of it knocked him from the saddle, and he felt himself fall, knowing he was going under the hooves of the roiling herd—

He woke with a wrench, one hand clutching his side above the hip, still feeling the dream-echo of that wound. Disorientated, Mal looked blankly at the panel of consoles before him, finding them all dark except for the comm, which was buzzing with empty white noise.

Serenity was still adrift, dead at sea and empty, her heart stopped and her lungs no longer providing oxygen for her sole remaining crewman. Mal struggled to separate dream-state from the nightmare of reality. As he felt the first rising beam of light through the bridge window against his face, his thoughts were of the sun back on Shadow, and was still tasting the memory of dust and of horse sweat, fragrant and dry in his mouth.

Decisions decisions...

Tue, 20 Dec 2005 16:52:30 GMT

It MUST be Tuesday. I've got a deadline to get this issue off to the printers in a little more than an hour, and suddenly my keyboard shorts out and won't type three out of every four keys. Mmmmmm.... Tuesdays...

I have a choice between Xmas carols and Rage Against the Machine... on mornings like this, Rage Against the Machine must win out! (What can I say, I've a weakness for a damn good bass line...)

Mon, 19 Dec 2005 18:00:12 GMT

I've posted this to a pair of Firefly fic lists, and might as well post to my own journal as well. I mostly blame agentotter for this, as well as the creative soul at www.heresluck.net for her wonderful fanvid of the same title I'm blatantly stealing here. I'm pretty new to posting fanfic to LJ, and new to media fandom too, so be merciless with me in regards to critique. I'll post chapters as I finish them up, but can't promise as to how often that will be, considering the general holiday madness.

Firefly Fic: Thistledown Tears
Author: bbikitten
Rating: Adult
Crossover Firefly/Deadwood
Timeline/Spoilers: AU, pre-film
Summary: The crew of the Serenity follow an honest job to Deadwood, and find the violent town difficult to escape…
Credits: The good ship Serenity are her crew © Joss Whedon (Damn you, Joss!). Deadwood and her inhabitants © David Milch & HBO. “Thistledown Tears” lyrics by Jeffrey Foucault; thanks as well to agentotter for inspiration and heresluck for her wonderful fanvid "Thistledown Tears." Original song "Thistledown Tears" © the marvelous Jeffrey Foucault.

~ ~ ~

don't cry your thistledown tears
the flood and the fire, they both come clear
the time to wrestle the angel is here
the night is quickly passing

~ ~ ~

The cold rain and a bottle of gutrot that passed for backwater whisky were all of the company Mal could tolerate. He stood motionless save for an occasional succor from the bottle, his back to the town below and his bare head bent against the rain. Gusts of wind tugged at his coat, but the burn of whisky down his throat kept the weather at bay.

The settlers had chosen a deforested hillside overlooking their camp for the graveyard, although Mal had been in Deadwood now long enough to suspect that the badlands beyond hid more bodies than those cared for enough by someone to be to planted here. Most of the gravestones were wooden markers, some with names carved upon them, other simply wooden sticks lashed together in the form of an empty cross. Among those weathered markers, the flicker of movement and the flash jewel-rich color that made up Inara’s headstone were as seductive as a willow-o-wisp in the forest.

They had buried her before dusk, with the Shepard saying the necessary words, and those of the rest of them who could shed their tears doing so. Mal had kept his own grief tightly bottled, too aware of their vulnerability on that bare hillside, the whole of his crew clustered together in an invitation to any rifle. He had hurried them all back aboard the ship as soon as the last shovel of dirt was laid in place.

This miserable hillside would not have been Inara’s preference for eternity. Night still hid the worst of the view for a few hours yet, but Mal knew it wouldn’t improve with the dawn. Deadwood was a filthy place, with the streets all mud and the buildings all of raw, unfinished timber. Plumbing was a contested, pinching seat in a stinking latrine, if you could find one. Slops and chamber pots were cast in the main street, to be churned into the mud along with the dung from the horses and oxen. Even the lanterns and torches which lit the place at night left a dirty smudge on an eye.

There was a whisper of sound behind him; Mal began to turn, reaching after his gun even as his ears recognized Zoe’s step. He stared at her bleakly, letting the pistol slowly back into its holster.

“Told you to stay with the boat,” he said.

“Yes sir,” she answered, but there was nothing repentant in those words. Zoe stood just there beyond his shoulder, a dark angel in a drover’s oilcloth, beads of rain dripping from the brim of her hat. She asked no questions, just stood her ground and waited.

He took another swallow of whisky, shifting again to face the grave. For a moment, an abyss at his feet seemed to gape wide, threatening to topple him. Raw as it was, the whisky wasn’t strong enough to chase away the feel of Inara’s dead weight in his arms, or the stink of blood and burned flesh from his nose. Her death seemed more real to him now, at this moment, than it had when he and his crew had been burying her. He could wrestle with it, pin it down, know it as a truth and a certainty – but somehow, the knowing of a thing and the **feeling** of it were two different beasts. Seen small and on repeat like the fragments of song, the flickering hologram of her gravestone was a mockery of Inara’s real beauty. He wanted the smash the things to pieces – one good kick would do the job. But then even the ghost of her would be lost to him.

The rain continued to fall around them, drumming a soft patter against the turned earth and mud. For a moment, a fresh gust of wind brought the tang of woodsmoke up from the town, and with that was a distant, off-tune tinkle of the Gem’s saloon piano.

Behind him, Mal felt Zoe’s presence, steady and fixed and as still as the one of the grave markers. Whatever she was thinking and feeling, she kept it to herself with that peaceful quiet that a damnfool could well mistake for tranquility, just before it killed him. She made no demands, but her silence was much a call to action as it was a comfort. He took another pull from the bottle, hardly feeling what he had drunk so far. He was determined not to speak, knowing it was his place as captain to remain in control of himself before his crew. Even before Zoe, when she surely knew him better than he knew his own self. But his determination failed him, as he felt himself crashing against her still silence. “I don’t want to leave Inara here,” he confessed. “Not in this rain.”

“Yes, sir,” Zoe answered, gentle-like, as if her captain’s words made any sense whatsoever.

He raised the bottle, and found to his surprise that it had gone empty. The rain continued with a fresh swirl of wind, bitter cold to the exposed skin of a man’s hands and face. Mal tossed the bottle aside, as far as he could fling it, and was rewarded with the distant shatter. He took a deep breath then, gathering in what might prove his last sight of Inara’s smile and dancing eyes. Even washed-out as the headstone projection was, he gathered the sight to him and wished to cradle it, as he had the empty, tortured shell of her. Then he closed his eyes, swallowed down the heartbreak, and turned to meet the waiting face of retribution.

“That man Swearingen is responsible,” he growled, and his words were met by Zoe’s shallow nod of agreement. “It’s time to go and collect.”

~ ~ ~

I'm already half done with the next part, but just gotta say, for the record... what chatty bastards these guys are! ;) Hard to get them to DO anything, they just want to throw out the snark...

WTF?

Mon, 19 Dec 2005 16:39:22 GMT

My mind is figuratively doing one of those endless-repeat-TDS loops of John Stewart making a "WTF?" face... Every time I think I can't be further shocked and horrified and woefully embarrassed to be an American... this numb-brained President opens his mouth again.

WTF?

In his speech this morning, the Shrubs stated that it was shameful that the press has written about Bush's policy on spying on American citizens. Not that his actions were shameful, but that the reporting on it was.

No, wait. He's really saying that the =leaking= of the story to the press was shameful? Hell, I'm ashamed of the NYT for having sat on its craven ass for a YEAR. Did they know about this before last year's elections? ::grumbling bitterly...::

D'oh!

Sat, 17 Dec 2005 23:05:29 GMT

I've been nose-deep in workstuff all day, and just looked up and saw it was almost 3:00 p.m. I knew the local food bank closes at 3:00 p.m., and we had a box of goodies and a turkey to donate for the local Christmas Greeters program. The goods need to be in by Monday in time for the Thursday Greeters distribution, and I know Monday's gonna be crazy with the paper deadline and all, so I grabbed the car keys and the turkey and the dogs, piled into the car, and rushed the three or four blocks downtown to the food bank. Got the goods in as Chenowith was closing the shop up, and yay, she was happy to see the donation. So there we are, standing on the street and talking, and I look down to realize... I'm wearing my flannel PJ bottoms still. D'OH! Had changed out of my jeans after our trip to the coffee shop this morning, and completely forgotten...

Snow?

Thu, 15 Dec 2005 17:48:57 GMT

It's 27 degrees out there, and we've got freezing fog. Plus a few random flakes of snow falling. Obviously, that's snow that lost, or premature, or too weak to make it to the Cascades. Still, it's nice and purty to look at.

Still suffering from an aching NEED to sit down and do some concentrated writing on a Firefly/Deadwood crossover that's just eating away at my brains. Unfortunately, I've simply got way too much work (office and otherwise) that must take priority. Waaaaah.

But through the wonders of fanvid, I've stumbled across the marvelous folk singer Jeffrey Foucoult. Napster finally is paying its weight on my desktop here. Usually you say "folk singer" and I start inching for the door, but this guy is wonderful. **sigh** Not that listening to him isn't just making me want to write forbidden fanfic even more...

A question for the smart folks out there...

Thu, 15 Dec 2005 04:25:03 GMT

Braaaains... I neeeeeed braaaaaains...

If you're standing on a moon and looking up at the night sky, and there's the reflection of sunlight off of the planet you're orbiting... what would you call that? Not "moonlight," although that's immediately what the reader could connect imagery too. Not "earthlight" if it's not the Earth... ??? Surely someone much smarter than I knows what that would be called...

Wed, 14 Dec 2005 22:46:20 GMT

It's not as if I don't have far too much work to get done between now and the end of the year... but I'm simply **burning** to write a Firefly/Deadwood crossover fic. I blame agentotter for this. It's all her fault, since she forced me (kicking & screaming, of course!) to sample the joys of Firefly fanvids. Mmmm... lovely, luscious Firefly fanvids. Why aren't there MORE? (Of the good ones, that is... found just as many stinkers as treasures...)

Apparently there's a world on the Outer Rim called Deadwood, so, really... why not? The kernel of the idea has been planted in my unwilling mind, and while I struggle mightily to be a good girl and work on the overwhelming amount of honest pay-the-bills work sitting on my desk... I can't seem to shake the desire.

Firefly/Deadwood fanfic. Surely someone out there in the great 'Verse has beaten me there already...

Wed, 16 Nov 2005 16:52:30 GMT

You scored as Serenity (from Firefly). You like to live your own way and do not enjoy when anyone but a friend tries to tell you that you should do different. Now if only the Reavers would quit trying to skin you.

</td>

Serenity (from Firefly)

100%

Bebop (from Cowboy Bebop)

94%

Nebuchadnezzar (from The Matrix)

81%

SG-1 (from Stargate)

69%

Galactica (from Battlestar: Galactica)

63%

Millennium Falcon (from Star Wars)

56%

Moya (from Farscape)

31%

Enterprise D (from Star Trek)

13%

Your Ultimate Sci-Fi Profile: which sci-fi crew would you best fit in? (pics)
created with QuizFarm.com

... plotless galore, just need the writing spark to be lit...

Mon, 03 Oct 2005 01:08:03 GMT

As bummed as our first viewing of "Serenity" left us, Ron and I found ourselves with the afternoon free (our Makindu booth was rained out), so we've got tickets for another showing. Sitting now in a Starbucks killing a little time before it starts. Ron is being a good writer and **writing**. I'm uselessly spinning my wheels.

It's marvelous to be married to someone who shares your kinks. Creative and otherwise. :) But I'm feeling seriously outclassed here. He can write right now, and I can't. The jealousy I feel is keen and bitter.

On the positive side, another road trip from B'ville to C-town with Ron meant another new story plotted. One, maybe two. And all about someone else's character. Now to simply get it written before Dec. 31.

Hell. We maybe spend too much time plotting. Get us in a small, enclosed space, and we plot like crazed weasels. Now if I could only write enough to keep up with the storylines! In some ways, it just leaves me cranky and unsympathetic with other members of Kaz, when they complain about not knowing what to do with their own characters. I want to just say "Heck, just spend fifteen minutes plotting with Ron (or some other member of the the club -- there's only a few dozen to choose from, really!)" We start talking about characters we don't own and come up with plots aplenty. I think we really DO need to jumpstart the Kaz story chatroom sessions that we used to have, to try and spread some of the plotty madness...

Some thoughts on Serenity

Mon, 03 Oct 2005 00:45:46 GMT

Serenity thoughts... Spoilers, so don't read if you haven't seen the film yet!

Ron and I went to see Serenity Friday afternoon. I had already been spoiled regarding the deaths of both Book & Wash. Ron complimented me later on being able to go for months without spoiling it for him as well. Personally, I was just praying that we'd sit down and find that Whedon had shot two different films, and that preview audiences had seen something we wouldn't.

Silly me. ::sigh::

Let me add now that neither Ron or I ever watched Buffy or Angel. We were Joss virgins before being convinced that we simply MUST watch Firefly on DVD. I've seen some fans saying that this is Jossverse so we can hope for characters to be brought back to life -- but that just seems badly **wrong** for the 'verse that Serenity flies through. I mean... Wash as a zombie? No. Thank you. My love holds **some** bounds, I suppose. :)

I've been sort of haunting LJ off and on this weekend, looking for post-film meta to help get me through the "this sucks!" mindset.
While I can see and appreciate the value of Wash's death (and Book's as well) in terms of story crafting, I can't shake my love for the characters and not be left wanting to make some vain protest. Ron and I were both just wandering around dazed Friday afternoon after the film. If it weren't for the Eugene Celebration yesterday and our Makindu volunteer efforts, we probably would have spent the entire weekend sitting at home moping around in a shared funk. I mean, SERIOUSLY. How pathetic is that? These ARE just characters in a piece of fiction, not members of the family! But... hell, I've got family members I'll miss far less than I'm already missing Wash!

CRUDE WARNING: Gotta share Ron's response to this. Halfway through the film, Ron says he started squirming in his seat, really **needing** to go take a bathroom break. He kept putting it off and putting it off, and that the pressure of his bladder was beginning to get painful when -- bang! Ron was so taken by surprise by Wash's unexpected death (and so scared that other characters were going to get killed off next) that he completely forgot his bladder.

I know there's hopes that maybe a good turnout for the film will mean more Serenity films, or a renewed series contract with the Sci-Fi channel. And yes, if so, I'll be there to enjoy what more there is to enjoy of the Captain and crew. But it can't be the same creature without the characters we've lost so far -- and what characters will Whedon kill off next? (Not that I wouldn't be happy to see River & Simon jettisoned -- they're my least favorite by far... but I fear it's too late for that. ::sigh:: Can't we trade off "the barefoot hippy chick & her incestuous brother" for Wash, please? A two for one deal, or something??)

An additional thought... some reviews I had seen of the film before Friday had complained about the lack of response from the crew to Wash's death, so I went into the theatre completely expecting the last third or quarter of the film to suck. But I **was** pleasantly surprised. Zoey's grief is spoken in actions, and when Kaylee figures out that Wash is gone -- oh, yeah, grief happens. I can see how folks who didn't already know the crew from the series might think the characters weren't reacting enough to Wash's death, but I think that sequence was quiet in character, especially for Mal, Kaylee & Zoey.

randomness...

Fri, 16 Sep 2005 02:34:50 GMT

It's been one of **those** days. Planted in front of the comp from 7 am to 7 m, working on an absolutely wrteched project for the high school, the same one I dread every year. Just gave up, and realized I forgot to do laundry. Bleh.

Thank god for TiVo. How did I survive without you in my life before now? Thank you, too, John Stewart. You keep me sane.

Talking sanity, or the loss of it... had a freaky moment on Tuesday, when I was driving up to Albany on a deadline -- had to get toner for the HP and back again in time to get a job printed. As I was puttering up Highway 99E, heading toward Tangent, a semi with one of those two-rack car transports passed me, full of wrecks being taking to a yard somewhere, I assume. The semi came at me around a corner, and there was a red sporty sedan up above the cab. The sedan had a pretty crunched-up front end, and through the spiderweb of the front windshield, I **swear** there was someone sitting in the sedan's steering wheel. I could see teh hands pretty clearly, but didn't have any impression of facial features.

I about drove off the road. It was **freaky**. I'm assuming it was more of a trick of shadows and the fracture pattern of the windshield damage, combined with my own imagination. Because I sincerely doubt someone was sitting up there, and I doubt even more than I saw a ghost. I mean -- heck, I believe in ghosts, but I also believe that you could have a string of them doing a conga line around me in a room and I'd be completely oblivious to 'm. ;) My particular radar is done broke, I'm sure...

But it was just **freaky**. Because I tell you, I saw **hands** pretty damn clearly. Big, square guy-type hands, at about 2 pm and at about 10 pm. Weird weird weird...

Tangent... so, how long ago did this season for SG1 start? Didn't the season just start up? Why are they already advertising a season finale? I'm soooo confused...

WTF?

Tue, 06 Sep 2005 01:07:06 GMT

According to NPR Marketplace & Editor & Publisher, Barbara Bush visited the Houston Astrodome today and had this to say:

"And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway, so this (she chuckled slightly)--this is working very well for them."

... do you need a distraction?

Sat, 03 Sep 2005 16:07:14 GMT

Go and see The Constant Gardener. Oh man. Oh my. Best film I've seen in a long, long, long, long time. Surely this wasn't made by someone in Hollywood? As always, Ralph Fiennes is hot hot hot hot hot; the acting is just wonderful across the board. Kenya is absolutely incredible to see -- yes, Virginia, that is NOT a California backlot, and the authentic tone it sets is priceless. The pacing and time flow are beautiful, and the way the film ends... oh wow. Wow. Go see it. You must. This is just an incredible film!

cut and paste job...

Sat, 03 Sep 2005 16:04:14 GMT

This is stripped wholesale from an email someone just sent to my office account -- it's probably from a blog somewhere. But I can't help but repeat the crime:

In September 1999, Hurricane Floyd -- a category 3 -- was bearing down the Carolinas and Virginia. President Clinton was in Christchurch, New Zealand - meeting with President Jiang of China (you know, actually working). He made the proclamation that only Presidents can make and declared the areas affected by Floyd "Federal Disaster Areas" so the National Guard and Military can begin to mobilize.

Then he cut short his meetings overseas and flew home to coordinate the rescue efforts. This all one day BEFORE a Cat-3 hit the coast. That is how you do it.

How about this dope's own father during Hurricane Andrew? Once again, President Bush (41) -- August, 1992 -- was in the midst of a brutal campaign for re-election. Yet, he cut off his campaigning the day before and went to Washington where he martialed the largest military operation on US soil in history. He sent in 7,000 National Guard and 22,000 regular military personnel, and all the gear to begin the clean up within hours after Andrew passed through Florida. 'Cause, you know, those people and their stuff was actually where it belonged, rather than being used for insurgent target-practice halfway around the world in a vain effort to make Iraq safe for Iranian takeover.

In August of 1969 when Cat-5 Hurricane Camille hit roughly the same area as Katrina, President Nixon had already readied the National Guard and ordered all Gulf rescue vessels and equipment from Tampa and Houston to follow the Hurricane in. There were over 1,000 regular military with two dozen helicopters to assist the Coast Guard and National Guard within hours after the skies cleared.

Bush 43 - August 2005 - Cat-5 Hurricane Katrina bears down on New Orleans and the Mississippi gulf. Both states are down nearly 8,000 National Guard troops because they are in Iraq -- with most of the rescue gear needed. Bush is on vacation. The day before Katrina makes landfall, Bush rides his bike for two hours. The day she hits, he goes to Johnnie McCain's birthday party; and lies to old people about the multi-billion-dollar pharmaceutical company welfare boondoggle. People are dying, the largest port of entry in the United States (and fifth largest in the World) is under attack. Troops and supplies are desperately needed. The levees are cracking and the emergency 1-1/2 ton sandbags are ready, but there aren't enough helicopters or pilots to set them before the levees fail. The mayor of New Orleans begs for Federal coordination, but there is none, and the sandbagging never gets done. So Bush -- naturally -- goes to San Diego to play guitar with country singer and lie to the military about how Iraq is just exactly like WWII. The levees give way, filling New Orleans with water, sewage, oil and chemicals. Ten percent of all US exports, and 50% of all agricultural exports ordinarly go through this port. It is totally destroyed. Bush decides he'll end his vacation a couple of days early -- TOMORROW --BECAUSE HE HAS TICKETS TO A PADRES GAME! He goes back to the Fake Farm in Crawford, with every intention of doing something on WEDNESDAY about this disaster that happened starting last Sunday night.

.. boggling...

Sat, 03 Sep 2005 16:03:07 GMT

Like everyone else in the Dryer States of America this past week, I'm just boggled and ashamed regarding the state of disaster relief in NOLA. We can delivery supplies to Bangladesh two days after a tsnuami, but adequate supplies don't even BEGIN to arrive in NOLA until Friday, five days after the hurricane?

It's been said far more eloquently by many, many others. But this is horrifying. And disgraceful. And you **know** race and class were factors when those poor people were left to drown. And just watch the spin begin -- how in the hell can they call Clinton the "Teflon President" when you just **know** Chimpy will walk away with this without much of a negative impact being taken by his base? Just further proof that there are two Americas. Those in the Reality Based Community, and those kool-aid drinkers who aren't.

(I'm trapped daily in the office with my father, who's drunk so much kool-aid you can't even laugh at it anymore... The lengths True Believers like my Dad go to in order to defend Bush and his Administration would be funny, if it just weren't so damn SAD.)

someone pass the tissues, please?

Mon, 22 Aug 2005 15:02:14 GMT

Still devastated after last night's finale for "Six Feet Under". A wonderful send-off to a great series. The last few minutes had me weeping like a baby. Heck, I'm sniffling and blotting tears just typing these words. I **hate** getting emotionally worked up over a television series, for Christ's sake, but man... Just fine stuff.

Wed, 17 Aug 2005 14:46:42 GMT

Now only if the rest of my day proves to be as good:

Mal

Which Firefly Guy is For You?
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My super power...

Tue, 16 Aug 2005 20:02:34 GMT

Ron took me to see the film "Sky High" last Friday, and we both loved it. Fun & funny. We had that old "if you could have one super power, what would it be?" conversation on the long drive back home. And then it came to me: my super power, if I could have it.

I want to be The Editor.

Seriously. Super strength or spidey senses or Wolverine's superskeleton and wicked claws -- piffle. Weaklings. The Editor would be all powerful!

Being long-time gamers, both Ron and I immediately started layering limitations on the power (ala -- never give players an open-ended Wish spell), but it still sounds like the perfect superpower for me.

Tailored, my ideal The Editor superpower would be the ability to write one sentence which would become a reality the next day. Even with the limitation that you could write someone's death or suicide, or write physical damage to a person, or even rewrite history which has already happened.... oh man, just the very thought of the carnage I could lay waste... ::evvvvvvil laughter::

And what would The Editor's first use of superpower be? Oh, too much fun to even contemplate... That critical first sentence would just HAVE to revolve around a video being aired by iFilm and various media outlets showing Bill O'Reilly & Rush Limbaugh in a sexually explicit act in some men's bathroom, complete with audio that quotes O'Reilly begging for Rush to do him hard, just like his dittoheads ask for it. Rude and crude, yes --- but just the very thought of such a taped encounter being spread across the Internet just leaves me blissed. Ah, the long-term ramifications...

Yes. The Editor. That's the superhero power I want!

Adventure magazine, on newstands now!

Tue, 16 Aug 2005 19:31:23 GMT

It's out! It's out! It's finally really & truly OUT!

National Geographic Adventure magazine has the story by Tim Cahill about last year's 2004 Proper Walk in Kenya, on behalf of the Makindu Children's Program. It's marvelous!! Not enough said about Winnie or Steve or Diana's much-mocked umbrella that saved them all, but it's still a riot of a good read. (Diana's description of the great camel tick infestation is even more gruesome than Cahill -- I believe we've got photos of that on the website. If not, I'll have to make sure we get those photos up there. Absolutely HORRIFYING to think that those huge, green blobby things were alive and pulled out of a camel's nose...)

I was surprised to find that the photos weren't as interesting as the ones we've got posted on the Makindu website -- well, maybe they are, but heck, I was expecting something marvelously MORE, y'know?

We've been waiting for this article since the start of the year, and it's just such a thrill to finally SEE it!

and on the same thought...

Mon, 08 Aug 2005 16:38:04 GMT

It's been quite the year (or two) for seeing local issues in national press. The state teacher standards & practices board decided to give Coach Reed a hand slap for the wound-licking business. I've been eyeballing Google News to see where the story goes, and like that proverbial floating bottle, the bugger is OUT there! The Atlanta Constitution was actually printing something with three or four hours of the decision (Georgia!), and since then I've seen papers all over the country reporting on it. And three of the latest international papers to have reprinted the story have been in India, New Zealand, and Bahrain.

Somehow, it makes me want to laugh... that someone in Bahrain or Bangalore is reading about our local high school football coach doing something really dumb, days before our own local community paper goes to print on it.