mediocrity at its finest

Respect

2011-12-05T07:10:00.001-05:00

I like to say I'm the kind of person who respects her elders. I stand and offer my seat on the bus when an elderly, tired, or handicapped person is near. My Southern manners are well-ingrained and I always say please and thank-you, yes ma'am and no sir when dealing with older people. (This is considered strange in the UK, and even insulting to some, so I've been trying to stop, also out of respect for the people I speak to.) Elderly people tend to strike up conversations with me in grocery stores and I'm always cordial and friendly, keeping things light, pleasant, and of a courteous duration. I know a lot of elderly people are lonely and feel threatened by youfs like me, and I don't want to be a part of the cold, scary world outside to good people who have been through so much.

But some people really abuse this aspect of my personality.

This past Sunday the fiancé and I were walking down the street on the way to the co-op for some cereal and toilet paper. It was chilly and grey but not actually raining so we were chatting and meandering when we both nearly slammed headlong into an elderly man with a cane who was intentionally blocking the entire sidewalk, which was itself enclosed by a wall on one side and a chain of cars on the other. I don't claim to know his mental health history but he spoke coherently and appeared fully aware of his surroundings, so I don't find the ensuing intrusion excusable on those grounds.

He asked Boy if he was a Christian. Boy smiled politely, said no, and moved to step away.

Our new friend proceeded to grab Boy on the shoulder and rest his weight there--remember the cane?--and begin to express his disappointment with me for allowing him to get to this state. He then waved his hands at me--hands with clean, well-maintained nails--and declared me to be weak of faith. He implored Boy to lead me down the right path and to head our family in a godly way--the kind of demeaning language that has gotten drinks tossed into the faces of several of my acquaintances--and then shifted his stance so he had Boy around the back of the neck and demanded that we pray with him.

Biting back a lot of things I said no thank you, have a good morning.

He kept right on, began to "oh dear lord" while trying to press Boy's forehead down to touch his. Boy straightened, smiled awkwardly and motioned that he did not want to participate. The elderly man ignored this, said "just a short one" and started again. Oh dear lord...

Out of patience, I stated, "Sir, you are insulting us. Stop it. Leave us alone." and walked away.

Boy managed to shake him off and caught up with me a few seconds later, by which point I'd worked up a really good fury bubble.

Who the hell does he think he is? Does the fact that it is Sunday give him clearance to go forth and say rude nasty things to people in the streets? Does the fact that he's elderly give him a free pass to foist his misogynistic and mindless world-view on innocent passers-by? Does the fact he's a Christian give him the right to accost people who he doesn't approve of in the most offensive way possible?

A few days ago a woman was arrested after a video surfaced of her saying astonishingly racist and xenophobic things to a diverse group of people in a London tram. All you foreigners, why don't you go back where you came from, I don't even recognize My England anymore, etc--all she needed to say was "baaah!" and show her teeth to fully round out the street-tramp cliché. People asked her to stop, first politely, then with rapidly dwindling courtesy as her vitriol intensified. At least two individuals caught this on their phones from different angles, and she was tracked down and charged with using discriminatory language intended to incite violence and hatred.

I see no difference between the Tram Tramp and the, what I'm sure most people would declare, sweet and well-meaning elderly man who tried to "pray over us." It was offensive, it was intended to be offensive, and it was clear that our confronter felt he had the right to interfere in our lives, regardless of the fact that we were in no way seeking to engage his attention or challenge his views.

I don't give a hoot what people believe in the privacy of their own homes. In your quiet living room you could think your microwave is sending messages on your behalf to the disembodied voice of Orson Welles floating in a gaseous cloud in space. You can think that you are the source of all goodness and light, or that your penis grants you some ineffable divine right. You can be as insane as you want to and provided you are not doing harm to anyone else and you aren't making a nuisance of yourself I do not care. But the second you bring it into the streets, the second you demand someone else listen to your ravings, you are getting into harassment and anti-social behaviour territory.

Importantly to this discussion, this elderly, feeble man reached out and grabbed Boy. Any attempt Boy might have made to free himself from this grip might have injured the man, something Boy was far too decent to risk. Yes, technically, he was not being held forcefully. But he abused our inherent decency to restrain and insult us.

Like everyone in England, I have the right to pass unmolested in my streets. I have the right to think how I want to think and not be held down and bullied about my lifestyle or opinions. Anyone who does so or attempts to do so is in clear violation of the law.

But I would never hold down an elderly man and tell him that his belief system is absurd anyway. I would never grip the body of another person and insult his way of life. I know this is not only mean and offensive but intolerant and not in the best interests of my community.

But for some reason we are obligated to tolerate these bullies, these gentle xenophobes who do not tolerate us and believe they do have the right to harass us in the streets.What, you want to press charges? A sweet old man annoyed you about religion for a few minutes while across town girls were being mugged? Sod off.
But had I done the same back, had I grabbed him and told him that the clear path to enlightenment and a valuable life is atheism and respecting women as your equals without any form of qualifier I would have been hauled off for assault.

If he wants to shout and try and hand out leaflets in the streets that is his business. Provided he recognizes my right to not engage and walk away, while I don't like what he's doing I am not going to get too bothered. In the grand scheme of things, I'm really even okay with letting the KKK and the Catholic League set up tables at fairs and markets, 'cos I don't have to listen and people who want to engage have an opportunity to enjoy some cathartic screaming. People who make a nuisance of themselves must be prepared to receive it in kind, and more so the more offensive they are. I'm confident the reason the Tram Tramp was charged was not because she was an asshole but because she had a captive and unwilling audience.

You want to do your best to offend your neighbours? Fine. But I better have the opportunity to ignore you.

2011-11-07T11:44:00.000-05:00

Some other ideas we're considering for a reception venue:

a Boat

a Pub Function Room

a Different Community Centre

Elopement

I read the news

2011-11-07T11:42:00.001-05:00

Today folks in the home office are furious to discover that for a brief time document checks on non-EU nationals were relaxed at border control. Staff were reportedly told to examine biometric data at their discretion and to only give people a thorough going-over if they looked dodgy so as to streamline processing, but protocol dictates that each traveller must be thoroughly poked and prodded before being allowed to continue.

As a non-EU national, I naturally have opinions with regard to this.

I've been flying into and out of the UK for years as a foreigner. And you know what? At no time of day have I ever enjoyed a speedy or even efficient jaunt through passport control. Heathrow, Gatwick and Stansted all have desks for at least 30 customs officials in a big two-tiered bank at the end of about a half-mile of queue switchbacks. No matter what time of day I've landed, however, I have never seen more than 4 people manning these stations. With an average processing time per passenger of 30 seconds, and an average of 3 planes of 400 passengers each landing at a time, even when you divide the queues into Domestic/EU and "Foreign" you still have about 600 travellers in your queue handled by 2 people, or a wait time of approximately 2.5 hours.

I have done that 2.5 hour trudge so f'ing many times the dread of it has actually put me off travelling.

So when I found out the reason behind most of these streamlining measures was to accommodate for job cuts at UKBA, I found it a little infuriating.

How can you possibly make job cuts when your staff is 0? There has never been anyone there, and now you want fewer?

Okay, maybe not 0. If the big 4 airports have 4 passport inspectors on at a time and they're running 24/7, I'd imagine they have 4 plus a break runner per 8-hour shift (or 15 people) plus part-timers on the weekend, so let's be generous and say 20. So 80 officials in the airports, plus another 20 dotted around at small airports and ferry terminals (oh who am I kidding, I've never seen a customs official at a ferry terminal.) plus the team on the Eurostar. Up to 110 in the entire country.

If they'd like to contest this and say "oh no, there's thousands of people on our payrolls--too many, in fact. We're paying too much!" I would like to very politely ask just what exactly they're all doing. Because they sure as hell aren't processing passports.

You wanna know how hard it is to get to Lewisham from Stansted when your plane gets in at 10pm? If you were able to get off the plane, go through customs, get your bag and leave in the space of twenty minutes like you can in Copenhagen, you could get a coach to Stratford Station in the space of about an hour and hop on the Jubilee line to London Bridge. By this point it's about 11:45, so there's a couple more Southeastern trains running toward your home (10 minutes) and if you have bags you could still grab a local bus from the town centre. Home by 12:30. Not too bad.

But no. When your plane arrives at Stansted and you have to queue for two hours at passport control, you come out and discover the coach service is partly suspended after midnight and the next one won't be around for another hour. So you get the coach as far into town as it will take you, which is still on the extreme north side of London, and at 2am you manage to find a night bus that takes you to a station where you can get another night bus to a third night bus which gets you somewhat near your town, allowing you to walk the last two miles home dragging your suitcase. Home by dawn with a blown-out knee and influenza.

Or you could pay £150 for a taxi and be home by 3am.

Note that I use the word "home." Home by dawn for someone who knows how to get around and already has an Oyster card. Think of the tourists.

But this isn't about how crappy London's public transit system is, or how it is run for use in 1954. Nor is it about how ridiculous it is that London businesses are only open when their customers are also at work. And for once this isn't about how it is patently obscene that pubs close at 11 on Saturdays and you can't find a pint for less than £3.50. This is about the fact that there's not enough people working at passport control, and now they've decided to fire half of them.

WHY is it that when the people stand up and demand that their government becomes more efficient with their tax money, rather than stopping paying for pointless vanity projects, moat dredging on their personal property, private cars and jets, and funding the "privately run" transportation industry, they instead CUT FRONT LINE WORKERS LIKE CUSTOMS OFFICIALS AND NURSES?

What arrogant bastard thinks cutting the people who actually get anything done is the smart way to save money? You know how long people have to wait for treatment at hospitals? It's not because there's not enough beds, examining rooms, operating theatres or equipment. There's not enough practitioners. You know how long people have to wait to buy stamps? There's nothing wrong with their stocks of stamps or the scales or trucks or mailbags. There's only one postal worker at counter with positions for 11.

The university system here is churning out hundreds of thousands of qualified graduates every year who just want to work. State-run services have room to expand. Indeed, there's desk space gathering dust for over 400 people in the airport passport control sector alone, more if people worked part-time.

Rather than expanding the state's middle--the paperwork-creator and paperwork-avoider cycle that always manages to occupy most of our nation's unproductive time and employment, why not cut most of that and focus on the workers--you know, the people who do things. Pay front-line employees a living wage to do a good job. Fill up the desks at passport control. Have nurses and techs available to handle minor injuries at A&E, and please pay my dustbin team and their truck maintenance crew enough to make it worth it to come to work when it's cold this winter.

We pay our taxes not so you can bicker about new laws or start new wars, but so that we can have services and systems in place that keep our society running smoothly. We need our bin-men, our nurses and pharmacists, our maintenance technicians and plumbers and teachers and dammit our passport inspectors more than you need so much as a taxi in central London. Calling all MPs: no one recognizes you. Take the bloody train and give us our workers back.

Site Visit Update

2011-10-27T19:19:00.001-04:00

So yesterday I viewed Hall Place and Devonport House, as well as dropped in on a pub with a function room that was nice but up a flight of stairs (mean to grandmas) and rather small, so no.

Devonport House was like Ye Olde English Pubbe in Heathrow Terminal 4. Fake. Superficial. Devoid of any unique features or character. I hated it from the moment I stepped in the door. They had two rooms and a bar available for large events, and while one of them was merely soulless, the other had the ambiance of a Denny's--the sort of place that you know if you tried to decorate it, it would just look even more soul-crushing. The meeting coordinator asked me if I had any questions, and I had a hard time thinking of anything aside from "where is the nearest exit?" Curse my politeness. Any further details and you'd surely run away. Moving swiftly on . . .

The first house I visited yesterday was a beautiful, amazing structure called Hall Place. Out about ten minutes away from Eltham, it a 16th century manor house, with a 17th century manor house stuck to it, surrounded by several acres of gardens and parkland. The duckling-covered River Cray cuts through this, and structures (including a wisteria-covered bridge) cross it at several points.

Great Hall at Hall Place. If I had a room like this in my house, I'd name the house after it too.

They offer their Great Hall, which is part of the 1537 build, as well as the adjoining Tudor Kitchen for parties and drinks receptions, plus access to the private courtyard (with a lovely knot garden), the minstrels gallery, and (in case of inclement weather) their upstairs Long Gallery which overlooks the Topiary Garden (which boasts a delightful collection of Heraldic Squirrels, as well as abstract pieces).

Tudor Kitchen, which sticks off the Great Hall like an L.

The venue boasts plenty of parking, as well as a greenhouse and café which are open to the public. As a gesture of formality, they open the main gates to the house (usually closed, and you have to enter via the public access point by the greenhouses) for cabs and limos and the like to drop the wedding party (and any handicapped guests) at the front door.

Long Gallery upstairs. The caterers would bring up sit-able chairs.

The place is gorgeous, that's a given. And everything is ready and right there. The Great Hall is absolutely fabulous. The (substantial) hire fee includes paying a few staff members of the house to wrangle tourists, who would still have access to other areas of the house, as well as the informal areas of the grounds.

A couple of problems I have with it, though: you have to use their on-site catering. Now granted, they appear to be fine, and they know the place well and are prepared to set up for it. That is their only vendor requirement, but it is a big one--the building controls the food and drink, so the selections of meals and beverages are rather specific. They do have some lovely vegetarian options and can offer a buffet instead of table-service, but the booze is the big thing. Boy and I aren't big wine drinkers, and the beers we like tend to be funny little micro-brews and local companies. I enjoy port and Boy doesn't mind it, but Champagne gives me an insta-headache and makes Boy want to run screaming from the room. I will of course offer wine to those who want it, but when it comes to ceremonial boozing, there are certain things we want that I don't think a caterer could offer.

Also, while it would be very difficult to take a bad picture in the whole setup, the bookings for this place are through the roof, which makes me feel like all of our photos would be...canned. As neat as it could be to take bride and groom photos nestled amongst the topiary chess pieces, they already have two other couples on their brochure doing just that. Lamezors. Their midweek rates included a full-operation package: ceremony, interval drinks, table set-up, meal, interval drinks, table clear-away, dj, cash bar, dancing, get out. Boring. You don't have to take the dj, but you do have to pay for him to not show up. Ew.

It is a perfect venue for a fairy-tale wedding. But I don't particularly want a fairy-tale wedding--if nothing else, weddings in fairy-tales are usually mentioned in passing right at the end. Before that there's ogres and witches and wolves and starving German children in cages. Eeeek!

A venue which is getting a bit closer to my cup of tea (though I'm not sold on anything yet) is Shrewsbury House in Plumstead. The best way to describe it, I would say, is early 20th century mock-Georgian manor house, usurped by Greenwich Council in the early 1950s, kept and maintained as one might expect the state to maintain a community centre ever since. The lighting is Functional. The spaces are Clean. The electrical cables are Enclosed in Plastic Troughs. The pipes are Exposed. I feel sorry for it.

But it offers a wealth of potential! It is beautiful, in its way, and it's incredibly versatile. The room hire would include the library (which used to be the Plumstead local library) and the lovely back room, with access to the garden. It offers parking, handicapped access, and adequate facilities in the event of a nuclear meltdown. That's right, boys and girls--Shrewsbury has a bunker.

The facility is a community centre first and foremost, but there's not a whole lot on the books so they're flexible. The site manager, a lady named Cathy who I absolutely adored, explained that the centre has had their budget slashed and the building has not received the sort of upkeep and updating it deserves for a number of reasons (mainly the people who've been running it are in their 90's and think the Internet is a fad), but they are trying. And as of tomorrow the library floor will be sanded and re-finished.

The beautiful back room has a potential hitch, but avoidable if we are in touch with them early enough: it is used during term-time as a day care, and as per Ofsted regulations it must be decorated in bright colours so as to designate it a children's place. Now, I'm planning the events for around Easter, primarily because a significant number of my Boy's family and our friends will be off work because they're teachers (so they'll be available to help out and hang out with my family, who regardless of vacation periods will not be at work). The pre-school teachers switch out their decorations and bulletin boards at the holidays, so if we let them know in advance, they can pull down the winter paper and hold off on hanging the spring décor until after the show. Then we get a pretty room that doesn't look like it's set up for toddlers. (And it does have such beautiful ceilings, and curvy walls!)

There is access to the upstairs rear balcony but not the front, but it is much prettier anyway.

The back garden also boasts a pleasant area with benches, a wisteria walk, and a rather utilitarian side garden that I may guerilla-plant some tulips in.

The institutional stuff can go away and be replaced with nice stuff. We can do whatever we want for food, booze, and furniture, as well as parlour games, music, and "Traditions".

I don't know, for some reason Shrewsbury is more attractive to me than Hall Place. What it lacks in Elegance it makes up for in Character.

Venue Shopping

2011-10-25T13:07:00.000-04:00

This week I will be visiting Shrewsbury House, Devonport House, and Hall Place, all in Greenwich borough, as I begin to look for reception halls. I've phoned and scheduled visits, and only Hall Place's receptionist didn't attempt to re-invent my name so it's going to the top of my list. It is also face-meltingly pretty. Go on. Have a look. Now look at their gardens. I'll wait.
UPDATE: BEAUTIFUL.

Shrewsbury has already essentially said it's not the best idea, but offered to show me around anyway. Apparently the local bridge club has called dibs on the pretty room on weekdays (and based on their society page I wouldn't cross them--too many canes)

Devonport House is a hotel, not exactly what I had in mind but they are very well-located (next to the National Maritime Museum) and would make accommodation easier.
UPDATE: HORRIBLE.

A list of decisions and declarations I've made in regard to this whole wedding thing:

NO DJs

NO marquees, tents, or making people wear heels in the grass

NO bouquet tossing or undergarment-groping-and-flinging

NO ceremonial standing-around of family members or friends

NO couple's first dance, dancing-with-one's-parent or f'ing DJs

NO veiling, head-scarves or wimples

NO religious paraphernalia or activity of any kind (offenders will be removed)

NO solo march down the aisle or gestures which allude to an exchange of my ownership

NO babies

NO speeches alluding to reproduction (offenders will be slapped)

NO chicken dance, electric slide, hokey-pokey, polka, Riverdance or group dances or DJs

NO Gifts

NO Smoking, Drinking, or Talking

NO Guests

GET OUT

----

I don't particularly like weddings.

In other news, why is beige chic these days? Even the prettiest of models look frumpy or naked in them. BLEH.

Bonus: Photoshop Hack-Jobs on Nordstrom's Dress Site Are Always Disturbing. It's the blend of confusingly-proportioned women doing bizarre contortions, strange lighting, and that hilarious paper-doll style cut-n-pasting (sized to fit with the liquefy tool) that turns a genuine dress-inspiration session into a hilarious, if unsettling joke. I enjoy going through the stacks of poses and dresses to try and find the original model-dress combinations. So far I haven't encountered anyone with an extra limb, but some of those double-sized heads look heavy.

Who has six inches between their thighs? What living person?

After a while you forget what human beings actually look like.

----

And finally, I've been rejected from two positions at the drugstore. Wow.

And then I spent a year unemployed

2011-10-24T14:02:00.001-04:00

I formally completed my MA a year ago this month. Let's have a look at what I've accomplished since then.

I have applied for nearly 300 jobs.
I have landed 2, both short-contract and painfully underpaid.
I have been formally rejected from about 20, and never heard back from another 278.

Since October of 2010 I have had approximately 6 weeks worth of work.
Of that, 2 weeks have been spent volunteering. 1 week has been more akin to "volunteering" (e.g. I was told I'd be paid, but then wasn't.)

I have been highly qualified for everything I've applied for. Some things I may have been over-qualified for but I gave it a shot anyway. I've applied for positions that offered a fair deal less than minimum wage, internships, very short contracts, permanent contracts, seasonal contracts, casual, ad-hoc, and even online gigs. Near home, far from home, impossible to get to, upstairs, downstairs, but not in my night-gown.

I gave up on applying for theatre positions a while ago and have been seeking development, administrative and reception-type work in pretty much any industry. Today I broke down and applied for three gigs in retail, as well as another half-dozen clerical positions. One of the retail applications asked me to confirm that I was at least 14 years old.

I need a drink.

I also need to get paid more than £1.50 an hour for the work I actually do, so I can afford to drink.

Even selling myself short has gotten me nowhere. This is absurd. I'm losing gigs to teenagers. In London it would appear that if it's not at one of the big 10 theatres it's simply not paid, and administrators should feel privileged to earn minimum wage--something I've always found stupid, because if you don't pay the people who handle the money enough to not be tempted by the money, you're begging for trouble.

My student loans are entering their 8th month of forbearance (after the initial 6-month grace period.) I can't apply for deferment because I'm not in the US and therefore can't register for unemployment. So they're just accruing interest while my MA gathers dust.

If I actually do find a position that offers minimum wage I may be able to start paying my fair share of the rent and the interest on the loans, but not the capital, and I will not be able to save anything. Whee.

I give it back. The degree, the education, the year. The waste of money and time and intellect. It wasn't worth it at the time, it isn't worth it now. I would have better luck finding a gig if I was still working on my GED. I'm not qualified to flip burgers.

----
Update: I have now also been rejected from all of the retail positions mentioned earlier. Woo!

Because that means I win (bad poetry alert)

2011-10-21T17:47:00.001-04:00

Plate Tectonics
Are Never Ironic
A continent shifts with no regard for who's on't
The planet don't care
Or even know who's up there

Don't give mundane events
Cosmic Significance
No one decided where it rains

Outbreed or Outlive the competition
And if nature helps out it proves our conviction

You think God saved you because you knelt down and prayed
But your neighbour did too, and got swept away
You gave happenstance a name
You think you're winning some game

The beauty myth has been packaged and sold
on the notion that winners don't have to get old
And this time I'll win
I'll show you the perfection of my skin
I'll be thin
And svelte, and sexy and more
Until the day I'm nine-hundred and four
'Cos I earned it
I did everything right
I smiled and I knelt and I sucked and didn't bite
I gave you what you wanted
And you gave back a lie

You obeyed the rules
Financed the schools
And it gives me no real pleasure here to say
The men who lead
They don't believe
But it keeps you down and props them up so they
Perpetuate
The cunning ruse
Where you pay them well to do nothing for you.

Doloreta

2011-10-21T17:40:00.001-04:00

I recently posted a photo of my next-door neighbours' two cats. They're very affectionate and playful, and their owners seem like nice, low-key people. They're in their mid-30's, moved here from Camberwell, watch chat shows and relax in their garden on sunny days.

I have no particular reason to talk about them.

My next-door neighbour on the other side, however, is a woman I've never met, a woman I've only seen twice in the nearly two years we've shared a wall. I believe she's somewhere between 30 and 60 and is Polish, but as I can't actually speak Polish I could be mistaken. I do not know her name, but for the purpose of this narrative I've decided to call her Doloreta.

See, I've gone so long with Doloreta as my anonymous neighbour that I feel like I know her, even though I know nothing about her, can't understand a word she says, and couldn't pick her or any of her visitors out of a line-up. From years of hearing bumps and murmurs, ringing and hammering, laughter and shouting I've crafted a picture of a very interesting woman who is almost certainly nothing like my actual neighbour.

Doloreta spends most of her time alone, and keeps a variable schedule. Some mornings her alarm goes off at 5am, other mornings at eleven--but most mornings it doesn't go off at all. I've decided this means she's a freelance journalist. I believe she sleeps in the back bedroom and leaves the front for guests, as I occasionally hear mobile phone alarms through the wall early in the morning but sounds of stirring more often come from down the hall.

Her garden is professionally landscaped, with a beige flagstone patio surrounded by spiny, pointy plants like pampas grass and bamboo that don't need tending but look discretely tasteful. It has a feel not unlike that of a spec house--generic shrubs around a reasonably-priced picnic table that no one has ever sat around and no one ever will. Nice, but impersonal.

I rarely hear her when she's alone, but when I do she's out in this garden, enjoying a cigarette and talking on the phone. She doesn't smoke often--I've decided she smoked regularly when she was younger but has gradually weaned herself off, particularly since she successfully separated from her husband.*

Every few weeks an angry man (let's call him Jakub) arrives to argue with her and drill holes in the walls. When the bickering starts I know to close my windows, because while the insulation between our houses is quite good they almost always take it outside. The reasons for their divorce or separation are many and complex, but as some part of their settlement he's agreed to fix up her house, possibly because they have a mind to sell it. Jakub is not particularly happy about this, and he's not much of a DIY guy, but he does it, sometimes for an entire weekend. He oddly never seems to be around when Doloreta's sister comes by, but the situation with him is frequently inquired after.

Doloreta's sister, a compassionate woman I've dubbed Sabina, has a jovial husband and young daughter, and the three of them drop round to visit every other weekend or so. Her niece is well-behaved, but Doloreta is inexpert and uncomfortable around children. She speaks to her the way I speak to cats, with an excited, half-whispered "oh boy! Look at you! Wow!" despite the fact that the girl is at least five and clearly doesn't appreciate that. Every half-hour or so Sabina's husband will usher the child inside and let the two women talk. On days when Jakub has been drilling holes in the walls the talk comes fast and bitter, and I imagine he's been pressuring her to sell the house and split the sale value with him. Then Roza will grow bored with her father and bound outside again for more of Doloreta's awkward praise.

Recently a stocky, middle-aged builder has come to share Doloreta's life on more pleasant terms than Jakub. His name, as I learned when I signed for a package for him from a flustered delivery man, is Piotr. A few weeks ago he spent an afternoon cutting down and destroying most of the bamboo grove that had been rapidly overgrowing Doloreta's garden. Piotr seems quiet but not unkind, and Doloreta's angry outbursts have reduced. I have decided Piotr is a Good Thing.

One day Boy happened to espy Piotr skipping rope out in the garden, looking like a short Polish Mohammed Ali training for a fight. Whatever he does for a living, the man likes to keep fit.

I have never understood a word of what has gone on next door, so absolutely everything I've said or decided about Doloreta is of my own invention. She may be lovely. She may be vile. She's probably just a person with her own concerns. But as long as she remains a mystery to me she will remain intriguing and exciting.

----

*Last summer I was feeding my tomato plants in the garden when three women came into Doloreta's garden and began to talk. I didn't listen closely to what was being said, and wouldn't have noticed at all except that the conversation had a funny meter to it. One woman would speak in English, one in Polish, one in Polish, one in English, one in English...and round and round and round they went. At the time I figured it was Doloreta herself facilitating a conversation for someone in the community, but it only really dawned on me recently that this was going on in Doloreta's garden, not in an office or public park. Why on earth would she bring strangers into her home to translate for them? My neighbour was talking to a lawyer.

A few months after this Jakub started coming around--sporadically at first, but with gradually increasing frequency. His first work visits were quiet and short, but as they got longer and more involved so too did the arguments. The Sunday morning 5am shelving installation event, complete with shouting, hammer-drilling, banging, door slams, and books on my side of the wall crashing to the floor nearly landed them a visit from a police constable, but it subsided. Things have been quieter since then.

University Baseline

2011-10-21T17:19:00.000-04:00

Several people yesterday linked Nicholas Kristof's "Occupy the Classroom" opinion piece from the New York Times, which got me thinking. While he had some lovely points regarding investment in early childhood education and socialization, and I would support such an investment of tax dollars wholeheartedly because I've seen first-hand the impact early development work can have on a child's life, it nevertheless calls into question a whole host of concerns regarding the structure of our society.

As Boy pointed out in our ensuing discussion of the article, the number of jobs available in our countries for uneducated people is diminishing rapidly. While high school kids and dropouts can still find positions waiting tables at late-night diners and (to a lesser extent) in retail, unskilled labour positions are fairly scarce and many community service positions have actually been usurped by the corrections sector. But I hastened to point out that what used to be "dropout" work now calls for a diploma, and what used to be diploma-level work now requires a degree. (Not necessarily arbitrarily: warehouse work used to just require a strong back and an honest demeanour; now forklift operators need to interface with complex inventory software and potentially-dangerous machinery. Fair enough.)

Of course, we can't overlook the simple fact that when everyone is expected to go to university, university education becomes valueless. The whole reason you go to uni is to make you more qualified than your peers for the career you want, so that you can get ahead in said field and make more money than you would otherwise. (Your mother wanted you to go to college so that you could get rich and take care of her in her dotage, not so you could smoke weed and discuss Kafka in a coffee shop.) But now everyone has a degree, so in order to stand out from the crowd you need to go even further: either earn an advanced degree or wear a really, really tight skirt to interview. As education rates increase, so too increases the baseline level of education you need to exceed in order to be considered exceptional. (Or employable.)

The fact is, the more people who graduate, the harder it gets for every graduate to find a job. The market is flooded now with unemployed applicants--at least 14 million in the US--most of whom have college degrees that they're still paying for. And now that tuition costs have begun to skyrocket, as governments withdraw funding due to over-subscription to the university system, the cost combined with your unimproved chances of finding employment makes your education even less valuable than if you didn't have one at all. (My MA is just getting more expensive, sitting in the filing cabinet, waiting for a job to come along and free my loans from forbearance.)

When we encouraged everyone to go get a degree, what did we actually accomplish? Whereas 10 years ago receptionists needed a high school diploma to qualify, now they need a BA. What once was a minimum-wage career has become a minimum-wage career that costs $20,000 just to apply. And every job attracts hundreds of qualified applicants.

And universities are challenged now, in the face of growing awareness of the plummeting net benefit of earning one of their products, to convince people that their worthless documents are somehow better than other schools' slightly-cheaper worthless documents. It's either that or go bust when everyone signs up for The University of Phoenix Online just to slog through the next required stage of debt accrual before they qualify for the dole queue. (In order to do so I believe recruiters are trying to draw a distinction between students--people who genuinely want to learn and engage with their education--and those who just want to get a stamped document saying they paid their dues. And maybe that's how education will evolve in this country. In-person education will become the remit of professional academics while the rest of us are processed by the one-size-fits-all internet diploma mill.)

But what is the next logical step to all of this? Needing a Ph. D and $100,000 worth of student loans in order to be a garage attendant? Co-authoring twenty papers on oral surgery over ten years in order to be a dental hygienist? People need to be able to work without fighting up an ever-growing tower of requirements just to get started. People need to know that their job won't be suddenly taken away from them when after five years they discover they're no longer qualified. Twentysomethings are still regularly becoming tenants, spouses, parents, and bill payers. They need an income that will actually cover their debts, even if they don't have an MBA and don't have time to study for one.

If we increase education for all, unfortunately, we make it harder for everyone to achieve. We merely reset the zero-point higher and longer away. I don't fault anyone who has enjoyed a good education who might not have in another age, but I also can't help but think that in the long run it isn't helping. I don't know how we can actually improve opportunity for everyone, but surely making it harder for everyone isn't the answer.

How Religion Lost

2011-10-21T17:09:00.001-04:00

It was not the atheists that instilled doubt.

It was not the feminists who undermined your authority.

It was not the blacks or the gays or multiculturalism or other people and ideas you seem to hate who interfered with your claim to rule the world.

It was literacy.

When farmers gained the ability to read, understand, and interpret the sacred books, a power previously reserved for holy men, farmers began to notice inconsistencies. Farmers began to notice contradictions, incorrect statements, omissions, and--most importantly--clear points of distinction between what the priests declared and the books said. When the lies were revealed by the very people who had been lied to the illusion was shattered.

See, funny thing--pretty much all lies don't hold up under scrutiny. That's why for thousands of years the clergy of the Catholic church made a point of preventing parishioners from actually understanding texts for themselves. Once higher education began to become necessary for the merchant classes, however, a new tactic had to be adopted--it was decided it was the burden of priests to learn Latin, read and interpret the books for the sake of the people, because, y'know, it's really hard. Rather than prohibiting reading, Catholics encouraged their audiences to be lazy and simply passively trust they were right and obey. That worked for most people (and still does for many), but within the Protestant persuasion (as exclusivity of knowledge was one of their bones of contention) just to be on the safe side the texts were re-written in archaic, highfalutin legalese (no, King James didn't really talk like that) in order to bore and confuse the inquisitive into stopping.

The same is true of the Glorious Qu'Ran--written in classical Arabic (the Middle Eastern equivalent of Chaucer), it is technically update-proof: any copy intended for general consumption or text which varies from the original, impenetrable writing style is considered an interpretation or translation and automatically inferior. The only way to have any idea what the whole thing Really Means is to study classical Arabic--an undertaking which only Imams and Islamic scholars would ever do. Indeed, the idea of even praying outside of Arabic is impure among Islamic fundamentalists.

This approach to teaching is still upheld in many religions, and is generally agreed-upon to be the most useful way of holding onto followers. The rules are in the book, and the book is available, but no one really reads it. Bible study classes tend to skip around and repeat themselves in order to avoid the really embarrassing texts--Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy and Revelation, in particular--and they're always led by an authority figure who makes a point of quieting opposition and questions that get too nit-picky. The contemporary faithful are given enough to feel close without enough to understand just what it is they believe.

Because the second you understand it, you realize just how amazingly absurd it all is.

NatWest: "and don't let the door hit you on the way out"

2011-10-21T09:22:00.003-04:00

Dear Complaints Department:

I recently transferred the balance of my NatWest step account to another bank and believe one of your employees may have attempted to subvert this process. A full two weeks after the scheduled account closure and transfer date (October 7) I contacted your friendly and helpful customer services department to ask where my money was. No one knew. The first time I called I was asked to wait half an hour for a return call. When after two hours no one called back I phoned again and was asked to wait up to five days for a return call. Two days later a friendly and apologetic customer service representative phoned to inform me that

somehow the balance in question had been transferred INTO ANOTHER NATWEST CUSTOMER'S ACCOUNT.

This has been corrected, and I am happily doing my business elsewhere.

But the big reason I left NatWest is that every time I have had to deal with your company someone has screwed up. From the wrong statements being sent to the border agency to your Swiss Cottage branch employees flatly lying and telling me I could only have an international student account to the Lewisham branch employees lying and saying I couldn't have an interim statement mailed to me in time to prevent me being deported, I've had nothing but incompetence, lies, laziness, and insults from your staff from day one. But this goes well beyond unacceptable and into criminal territory. Had I not contacted your friendly and helpful call centre someone in your transfers department could very well have gotten away with stealing my every last cent.

Why did I have to go out of my way to save my money from your employees' incompetence or sticky fingers?

How did you manage to successfully transfer my direct debit to my new bank but flatly fail to transfer my actual money? Yeah, my phone bill that went unpaid because my new account was empty. I had to go in and fix that too.

How did you manage to screw not only me over like this, but also my fiancé when he transferred his own account out six months ago? Yeah, the same thing happened: his direct debits were transferred, and his money never showed up. He wound up walking out of the bank with six months' worth of pay cheques in cash because your employees couldn't figure out how to transfer the balance for two months after he signed a transfer-and-close order.

Your business model appears to be "screw over customers until they complain" and is sincerely in need of an overhaul. What is preventing you from doing things right the first time? Why do you employ idiots and/or criminals to handle sensitive data and currency?

To sum up, your company's failures and lies have caused me to:

:pay for an account I didn't want after a viable free alternative was refused

:pay fees for non-payment of direct debits to my local council, gas company, phone company, and HMRS

:nearly be deported for incorrect balance data

:fight to have my money restored after its apparent internal theft

I expect nothing less than a sincere apology written by a human being, though a promise to review your systemic failures in training and employee screening would not go amiss. I'm sharing this information with my MP, except more politely. I am among your most dissatisfied customers, and think you should be ashamed of yourselves.

Oh Right

2011-10-06T08:26:00.001-04:00

Engagement. Not an upcoming engagement, a previous engagement, or a catered engagement. A declaration between two people of their intent to get married.

I has one.

We decided to tie the knot near the end of August, after I returned home from a visit to my family. We'd been talking about it with increasing sincerity and seriousness over the past few years, and particularly at the airport before I left to visit the States, but something finally took when I reached the customs official at Heathrow. I'd been standing in the "foreigners and scum" passport control queue for about two hours, dragging a carry-on bag full of memories and dirty underwear, when I was called to the desk by a middle-aged man who looked surprisingly content for a state employee. He bipped my passport, glanced at his monitor, and asked me, not the usual question of "why are you here?" but "how long have you been away?" I said three weeks, and he smiled and said "welcome home."

Welcome home. I realized then, with great clarity for someone who's been playing in-flight solitaire for eight hours, that home is wherever we are together. All the casual conversations and "we really oughtta"s took on a meaning beyond legality and convenience. It is time to commit ourselves to one another, not a nation. So after another serious and sincere conversation, we agreed to do just that.

----

As of Thanksgiving, Boy and I will have been together for seven years. We met when I was an Erasmus student at the University of Kent, about a month after I started this blog in 2004. Thanks to the modern marvel that is Skype we've been in constant contact since I had to return to the States to finish my undergrad--generally two to three hours a night every night of the week on the phone (and later, on video phone). We've enjoyed about three years of living in the same country, two of them consecutive, and are looking forward to many more.

----

We have an appointment to give Notice of Intent on the 23rd of November here in Lewisham. We plan to hold the ceremony in the registry office to make sure it's all done right. I've known too many people who've had weird things go wrong--from my mom being issued a new social security card without anyone ever writing it down, to couples sitting down to file their taxes after a year only to find out that they were never actually married, to people winding up with misspelled official names and brand new birthdays. Most of these things can be sorted out without too much trouble, but I'd rather not push it. UKBA nearly denied my visa because I was missing 8 days worth of bank statements thanks to NatWest's idiocy policy.

----

Our landlord still lives in Mexico and so far has no intention of moving back to London, so we can continue to keep our home. Since we cut down the huge cypress tree we've been getting more daring and may even hire a tree surgeon to hack some limbs off the ugly sycamore in the abutting neighbours' yard. If we make that investment I want to be damn sure we get to stay.

----

We are looking to buy an attractive ring for Boy in the next little while. I would like to see him in a court-style 6mm titanium band. They're shiny and scratch-resistant. And it's what my drill bits are dipped in so you know it's manly. I'm also open to him having palladium, platinum, or tungsten. Shiny. Sturdy. Simple.

Jumbled Thoughts

2011-10-03T15:07:00.001-04:00

I'll try to make clear distinctions between them.

----

I'm getting married. Soon. Well, fairly soon. I want April 5th. I like April 5th. It's a good date. It's a Thursday. I never could get the hang of Thursdays. Long-time readers of this blog may have noticed my spouse-to-be's arrival on the scene in November of 2004. Thanksgiving, actually. I've let my hair grow out since then, and started using punctuation. He's grown a beard and gotten a job. I think that means he wins.

----

I've never liked children. (cue half of my readers finding something better to do.) But I think there is some sort of mathematical principle to the noise they make. I call it the Exponential Baby Figure. One baby, quiet, equals one baby, but one baby screaming seems to magically become ten babies, all screaming as loudly as they can from every point in the room. Two babies screaming is at least 100, three is over three million, and any number over 4 would make a calculator cry ERROR. This expansion property seems to have the capacity to bend the fabric of space to accommodate for all of the mouths--which would make day care centres and maternity wards the most fragile areas of space/time continuity in the universe. Scary stuff.

----

I've been having a lot of nightmares lately. This isn't wholly surprising--I'm nervous and worried about many things these days and I'm sure my circadian rhythm is reflecting that. But they all seem to involve terrifying dolls coming to life and chasing after me. I don't like this.

----

I smushed my thumb in a door this past weekend. It still hurts and is somewhat blue, but doesn't look as bad as some people's smushed fingers have. I think the nail isn't going to fall off.

----

I just realized that Sallie Mae no longer has a British bank account and I now have to send money to my US account in order to make my loan repayments, at a cost of at least £25, plus whatever my US bank wants to charge, per transaction. This sucks ass. Their .co.uk website doesn't even exist any more. I thought I had options. Apparently I don't. Thanks, America!

----

I know the names of two of the four people whose houses are attached to mine: one of each partnership on either side. I have met two of the four people whose houses are attached to mine: the couple to the right. I wonder how typical this is.

----

dont let the dolls get me dont let the dolls get me dont let the dolls get me how on earth can i sleep?

Brown Thumb

2011-10-03T12:30:00.001-04:00

Moon over my tomatoes, a couple weeks ago. The weather has been warm and beautiful for the past fortnight, and days and nights have been clear. Just lovely.

Bowl of cherry tomatoes, with tea cozy for size. Each bowlful is about 120 tomatoes, and we've pulled in at least five heaping bowlfuls since I returned home from America. They've all been delicious.

But I am starting to think that maybe I planted too many. I actually have fewer plants this year, but they're more productive than last year, somehow. Not complaining!

This year's mutant. Not sure if it should be eaten.

Still on the vine. Taken this afternoon. They're really lovely. I've noticed that they generally don't go fully red until after you've picked them. They become a lovely deep orange colour on the vine, but if you let them go solidly red outside they almost always split and become food for critters. I pick them a day or so before they're deep red and let them finish ripening in the bowl. They're still sweet, juicy, and delicious.

A larger variety, just now beginning to turn. These are Marmandes and grow well in France. They grow pathetically in London. We're expecting to hit our main cold snap in a few days here and these are nowhere near ready. Better never than late, maybe? I don't think they'll ripen before the cold kills the plants. Fail. Also failed this year: bell peppers, dill, coriander. Also pretty much failed this year: lavatera (one plant bloomed), Nigella Moody Blues (one plant volunteered under a table) salad greens (planted as a peace offering to the snails; they ate the salad and everything else as well). Thrived this year: Gardener's Delights (cherry tomatoes, grow like weeds), courgettes (made several meals out of them), lemon balm (still haven't done anything with it), flowering tobacco (still blooming at the far end of the garden) and actually we got about five tasty apples off our tree. Others were eaten by bugs and squirrels. The rosemary, mint, thyme, and sage are doing okay, the primrose is hobbling along. Now that the cypress is gone we have more room in the sunshine for tulips, pinks and daffodils in the spring.

This is my tomato hedge. It is actually just six plants--four Gardener's Delights, two Marmandes. The forsythia in the centre appears to have made friends with its nearest tomato, as it is absolutely filled with them. I built them a trellis this year, supported by the latticework, the beech trees, and the forsythia, but the plants on the far side still decided to grow straight up through the trees and to the sky--a climb of about 12 feet. The miniature rose in the pot was an engagement gift from Boy's aunt that I just put in a larger pot.

Bornholm Dukketeaterfestival, Copenhagen and one bad photo of Sweden

2011-09-12T17:07:00.000-04:00

So. I've been out and about. Lighting and puppetry brought me to Denmark this past week. A quick flight got me and the cast of the show I was working on to Copenhagen, and after a few hours of aimless wandering we hopped aboard the night ferry to Bornholm. This little number was equipped with quite comfortable and spacious cabins for a 6-hour trip, with loos And showers. On the top deck you can see the shipping containers that accompanied us from the mainland being efficiently but slowly pulled to the pier. This ferry only does one trip each direction per day and is usually only ridden by a few lorry drivers. The trip back via Ystad, Sweden was only about an hour and was full of passengers and private cars.

A sample of typical Bornholm fare. These mackerel and herring were smoked on the island by a traditional smoke-house and donated by them to feed the puppet festival folk. It was amazing--seriously, the best fish I've ever eaten. Delicate and perfectly balanced smoke and salt. I had a few handfuls, along with some cheese and some structural bread.

It is tasty. It is beautiful. It weighs about two kilograms per loaf. It is Danish Bread, and you will not forget it.

A typical Bornholm home behind Svaneke's community centre, Svanekegaarden. A group of highly talented children performed a fire show and some acrobatics for us out here the first evening we were in town. In addition to smoked fish and a variety of white cheeses, the Danish eat sausages as part of their daily routine, usually shoved into a baguette in a rather humourous way. Use your imagination.

Another Svaneke home. My camera refused to capture just how vibrantly yellow most of the houses are. I think it's so the locals can find their homes in the snow.

The Svaneke harbour. It looks like there used to be a bit more of it. For non-Danish speakers, the closest phonetic equivalent is "Sffan-uh-kuh", with an a like in alcohol. If you pronounce it Sven-eekie you will baffle residents. Just FYI.

Ketch Tecla. Probably 90' on deck, iron hulled. Cute as a button. In Svaneke harbour.

This house was moving very fast.

A medieval lamp on display in the Middelaldercenter, near Østerlars. (Eustah-laas). The staff of the Center very kindly allowed us to sleep in and around their grounds, from the office to the cinema to the log cabin covered in medieval-style paintings. Everyone was amazingly nice and patient with all of us lunatics invading their space and sleeping in their workplaces.

One of my cast (taking a picture) who was hanging out with one of the creatives behind the Hesbjerg Dukketeater's Tommelise, or Thumbelina. This show was a very small, very short, very brightly coloured finger-puppet story for children that we didn't arrive in time to see, but they very nicely allowed us to play all of their musical instruments while we chatted afterwards--including the thumb piano, the bugle, the conch, and one of those nifty single-string instruments that you change the pitch of by squeezing. I didn't ask to play his clarinet though--that just seemed intrusive.

One of two cockerels who live on site at the Middelaldercenter. A costumed staff member informed me that so long as there are plenty of lady chickens to go around, dude chickens don't fight. So these guys were fit.

Me in a chain mail hood. Yes. I particularly like the way it fits over my glasses.

A view of the Middelaldercenter and surrounding countryside from the central tower. We tried to play Rapunzel but nobody could jump high enough to reach my hair. Alas.

Cockerel number 2. This one had lovely blue plumage but even creepier feet than the others. Bleh. Feathery dinosaurs.

Wild mushrooms in the forest. No, these were not woods. It was a forest, and you could tell, because of all the fairies and the children dropping bread crumbs and the witches and the wolves in grannies' jammies. No, I did not lick the mushrooms. It was all real!

Give puppeteers objects, and they will give you puppets. Nice folks. At the Bryghuset i Svaneke. (Brewery)

The only decent photo I managed to take out the train window on the way from Ystad to Copenhagen. This, dear reader, is in Sweden. The route was a short ferry from Bornholm to Ystad (Uh-sta), Sweden, then an hour's wait (in which I bought some salted liquorice-flavoured chewing gum just for the ew factor but did not get my passport stamped, sadface), then a train to Malmö (Mal-meu), then another train across the Øresund (Eur-sun) Bridge back to Copenhagen, a trip of roughly the same duration as the first from Køge (Cuue) but not nearly as comfortable or convenient. I discovered on this high-tech train that something ugly happened in regard to Cairo and the Israeli embassy, but couldn't figure out who was out to get whom on account of the Swedish news reporting.

A shot of the Danish Parliament tower and a few state-esque buildings. I thought it was nice.

This drawbridge between the Copenhagen city centre and the neighbourhood of Christianshavn is pictured on the 200 kroner note. Interestingly, aside from the 50 kroner note (worth about £6.50 or $9 and will generally buy you one pint of beer) and the 10 and 20 kr coins, there are no people on Danish money. Even the watermark on the 100 and 200 kroner notes is a boat. I found this interesting. And extortionate.

Someone's front stoop. Sorry person who's house I spent five minutes crouching in front of. I swear I was only admiring your nifty handrails.

A typical Christianshavn street. Bright colours, neat middle-road streetlights, and a delightfully eclectic mash of buildings surrounded by militant cyclists who defend their raised and well-paved bike lanes with terrifying (though polite) enthusiasm.

An older, quiet street in Christianshavn, near Christiania. I appreciated that this cyclist thoughtfully bought an antique-style bike to lean against her home for just this sort of photo-op.

At the end of the same street, second story. Squee.

This was a really neat neighbourhood, apparently self-governed (provided everyone behaves, I think) that was populated with equal parts stoners and nervous middle-aged people in tour groups. Because everyone is free to sell and smoke light drugs on the streets here, they have a strict no cameras rule. I took a couple of photos away from the populated areas, but resisted temptation otherwise. Which was a shame, because there was some really beautiful street art and other things going on in there.

We stayed in Christiania for several hours during the interim between our train arriving and our plane leaving. I haven't mentioned yet that we did all of our travel--trains, ferries, boats, buses, cars, walking--carrying a 7' long muslin bag filled with the dismantled components of the puppet show's set. We named it Denise and considered it the most obnoxious and bitchy member of the ensemble. Thankfully for the time in Copenhagen we were able to check Denise and our suitcases into the luggage lockers at the train station or we wouldn't have had nearly as nice a time as we did. I have no idea what this spire goes to but I really liked it and took about 80 pictures of it.

The Danish Parliament at dusk. It is difficult to tell here, but the ground floor is actually about three stories high--a disconcerting scale-twist that makes the building appear menacing and heavy. It appears to be only about four or five floors high, but is easily triple the height of a normal five-story building. We decided that the reason the Danish government is so nice and good to its people is because they fear the wrath of this building if they screw up.

Moments before we went back to the airport I noticed this weird anachronism--neat old buildings dotted with flashy-trash LED adverts. I found it very telling of the relationship the Danes seem to have with their neat old buildings--they like them enough to keep them, but they don't find them remarkable enough to not decorate them with ugly contemporary tat.

I really enjoyed my time in Denmark and would love to go back, perhaps after I've learnt a bit more Danish and stocked up on some fruit and vegetables. The regular meals of bread bricks and cheese were always tasty, but after a while I was desperate for some vitamins. The beer is excellent, the fish to die for, the people friendly and happy, and the houses are YELLOW.

Yay Denmark!

Bugs

2011-08-12T13:16:00.003-04:00

There are so very many insects here in South Carolina. I can barely step outside without getting the screaming heeby-jeebies.

Sounds of nature. Mmm. Cicadas, birds, Boeings, crickets, roller-coasters...

Everything is So Big. The appliances. The rooms. The spaces between things.

Everything is so Straight. The walls. The roads. The sense of decisive order.

Everything is so New. The houses. The cars. The silly young religions.

I'm here for a week. Then I return home to little, to wonky, to ancient.

Deer interwebz

2011-07-28T14:37:00.001-04:00

Plz look after Boy while I is away. He wud like lolcats and nerdage. Ssankou.

@GOP: Taxes are Not a Punishment

2011-07-18T14:31:00.008-04:00

They are a responsibility. They are a means of collecting money from the people in order to turn around and provide said people with a functional nation.

Tax money is used to maintain the roads that your donors' corporations haul their products around on, ensure that their private jets are built properly, provide them with an educated ~~and healthy~~ workforce, sustain oil wars for the sake of maintaining their extortionate fuel costs (though, to be fair, it is their privately-funded lobbyists who stand in the way of widespread adoption of ecologically-friendly and inexpensive fuel sources, not the state directly), and continue to create and uphold laws that ensure that life-saving drugs and treatments never go generic so their profit margins never falter. Your donor base benefits from taxation every day--indeed, far more in fact than most middle-class consumers who even now you're trying to screw in the face by replacing their Medicare and public education with vouchers so you can fund fundamentalist churches who will give that money right back to you.

Your donors are the people who most often use the tax-funded court system, trying to prevent each other from making money. They're most often protected by the rigorous enforcement of laws against vandalism--without which I'm confident far more disgruntled employees would cause damage to their factories and offices. They're most often bailed out when their decades of illicit activity and irresponsibility finally catch up with them. Not us.

Not us--us middle class goons and others who don't qualify for state assistance and never will, even if we hit rock-bottom. Not us consumers who you've turned a blind eye to when we've cried out for release from the crushing costs of insurance and debt that your donors turned toxic. Not us for whom cars are a taxable expense, not an itemized deduction. Not us who don't have a choice of what country to do our banking in.

We the middle-class are sick of paying for the lifestyles of your donors while receiving nothing in return. The intellectual elite that you seek so vehemently to silence are aware of the necessity of reasonable taxation on all sectors to maintain functional domestic infrastructure and healthy global trade relationships. Appropriate taxation is the only way to keep our roads in shape, as South Carolina's rutted tracks attest to. It is the only way to maintain a trained and honest police department, as Chicago's bribe-funded force can attest to. It is the only way to educate our youth, as the evolution-denying home-schooled kids who will never benefit your science-industry donors clearly demonstrate. It is the only way to equip our military, as Boeing is quick to remind you.

So seriously, enough is enough. Stop trying to distract your hot-headed voter corps with meaningless fights over whether-or-not churches should get state power or brown people should be allowed to immigrate. The answers are clearly established in the Constitution (no and yes, respectively) and are not up for debate--if you'd like to debate them you can do so we're not in an economy-crushing crisis. Stop prodding the powerless into attacking each other so they forget to hold you accountable for your jobs. Stop wading around in fluff legislation, waiting for the emergency imperative that you're clearly holding out for, and draft rational tax increases for the wealthy so we don't fall into the abyss that you, through your neglect, excavated.

Social Security did not cause this. Medicare did not cause this, except inasmuch as you've kept drugs extortionately expensive for the elderly so as to keep your pharmaceutical donors smiling. My grandma's pain pills are not expensive to make, distribute, or regulate. (Speaking of which, my grandma has never asked for nor received a $50,000 toy aeroplane.)

What caused this was three simultaneous wars, massive loopholes in tax laws that only the wealthy can exploit, free trade agreements that have allowed American companies to dump domestic employees because they want a fair wage, and freewheeling banking and insurance systems that ensure that unwealthy people are screwed if they get sick or their jobs get outsourced by your donors.

Those "job creators" you keep harping on haven't 'created' any substantive employment opportunities yet, despite enjoying the lowest tax obligation in our nation's history. Those "job creators" are in a prime field to put Americans to work right now--there's 14,100,000 unemployed people right now who would very much appreciate a reasonable income and group health insurance--nothing fancy. They don't want gold plated toilet seats, butlers or Bentleys--just enough support to live with dignity. Everything is in place right now for them to create those jobs you keep talking about, but they're not doing it.

Would you reckon they're waiting to create all those promised jobs until those fourteen million people and their peers drop the "with dignity" clause? Are they planning to bring their production lines back to the US the second we disband OSHA, or do we need to obliterate the pathetically inadequate minimum wage, open up our ecosystem to even more dumping, agree to pay for the injuries and illnesses we develop from from our now-unsafe workplaces and toxic food ourselves, and promise to not make them pay any taxes at all too? Are they expecting us to re-instate the Antebellum South to lure them back? Is that the trigger?

The problem is not us.

It is you.

Another Note I Sent to my MP

2011-07-15T13:52:00.006-04:00

You'd think I was retired, the amount of time I spend harassing my poor elected representative. Next I'll be writing terse letters to my local newspaper about disrespectful youths and how I've grown so fearful I don't let my corgis outside any more. Nevertheless:

Dear Ms. Ruddock,

Frank Field and Nadine Dorries' recent underhanded moves in regard to women's safe and timely access to abortion services have just come to my attention and caused me considerable concern. No doubt I'm preaching to the choir here, but I nevertheless wanted to reaffirm that your constituents will not stand for any more gross attempts on women's rights by religious fanatics and misogynists. If you can do anything at the legislative level to prevent their “little modifications” from being introduced into law, please nip this in the bud as soon as you can.

I moved to Lewisham in 2009 from South Carolina, an impoverished wasteland of Bible Belt Americana. While I would not describe myself as a refugee, my partner and I did very deliberately choose to move me here instead of him to the US simply because the UK did not appear to be teetering on the edge of a catastrophic Christian takeover at the time. So when I saw that LIFE ousted BPAS on the sexual health council a few months ago I greeted the news with dread—I knew more Fundie garbage would be dumped in our laps in time. And sure enough, now MPs Field and Dorries are seeking to sneak new regulations into the healthcare bill that will at once require women to receive unnecessary counselling and prevent abortion providers from offering it, a measure which would place private organizations with private motives between women and their reproductive rights. This, I'm confident you'll agree, is an outrage.

This sort of twelfth-century legislation crops up in the US all the time—most notably in South Dakota. There women must receive counselling from an independent “crisis pregnancy center” at least two weeks before receiving an abortion. All of these centres in the state are church-run, anti-choice, and make a point of misinforming women—from lies about cancer risks to fibs about complications, infertility, and God's Wrath, they'll make up anything. Then, of course, they don't stamp the necessary forms to prove that advisees came in—they just cheekily refuse to allow women to meet that requirement. Not that this matters—the state has driven out all abortion providers, even for when a woman's life is in jeopardy. Distressed women now have to cross to Wyoming to receive treatment--a trip of hundreds of miles, followed by weeks of paying for accommodation while they wait.

It is vital for the health, safety, dignity, and personal sovereignty of all women that these outrageous attempts are stopped in their tracks, and for the perpetrators of this attempted crime against women to be reprimanded. These scum have seen the “perforate and tear” approach crush women's rights in backwoods America and figure it is worth a shot here. It ain't. Please help them see that what they're attempting is unacceptable in any decent society.

Warm regards,

Ms. KG

P.S. Oh cool--I just discovered that a group of choice supporters will be rallying on the 9th of July in the Old Palace Yard, Parliament Square, from 13:30-16:30, over just this issue. I think I'll join them.

---And she replied!

Thank you for contacting me about your concerns over the amendments to the Health and Social Bill tabled by Nadine Dorries MP and Frank Field MP. I agree with your comments and please be assured that if the amendments are selected for debate or brought to a vote I will be opposing them. If there is an attempt to introduce them without debate I will certainly oppose that as well. Yours sincerely, Rt. Hon. Joan Ruddock, MP

And her assistant tacked on a reply too:

I hope you don’t mind me adding to Joan’s letter. I don’t know if you attended on Saturday – I was there and thought it was a very good event. Best wishes, Ms. Senior Parliamentary Assistant

Cherry O!

2011-07-15T13:22:00.003-04:00

No, this is not a repeat of the same pie. This is a Different Pie and it actually worked out a bit better than the last one. I stuck with Smitten Kitchen and I'm very glad I did, as most recipes out there call for sour or tart cherries and a bucket-load of sugar, but this called for actual edible cherries, a bit of lemon juice, and far less white-n-sweet. I even cut the sugar down from 2/3 to 1/2c just because I thought the strawberry-rhubarb pie was too sweet and figured it might be a schtick of Deb's--and as it was, I'm glad I did. It was just right.

I served it on the 4th of July to my British oppressors with plain ice cream. Everyone said they liked it, even the two people who didn't want to eat it because they don't like fruit. We then hiked up Blythe Hill and released some floating lanterns over the city. It was lovely.

Almost Tomato Time!

2011-07-14T18:57:00.007-04:00

Yep, it's another gardening post. Sorry, I can't help it. Plants are just so photogenic. We'll start with my lavatera, which looks like it wants to be violet this year: It's about three and a half feet tall with a laser-straight stem, covered in buds. Very excited. Last year the only one that survived came out white, and while it was lovely, I was surprised at the lack of colour.

And moving on to my courgettes, which I'm slicing off every Sunday to keep the plant active: Yes, that is a courgette leaf, and yes, that is my foot. I had no idea how big they would get. Mental note for next year: plant them further apart.

The hosta is doing its flowery thing: I know hostas are praised primarily for their leaves, but I think the flowers are pretty too.

The red shrubby thing has "bloomed" again--this is the second time this season it has put out red leaves. They're already fading fast to green. Whatever it is, I think it's happy. The red leaves are new, the lighter green leaves are from earlier this season, and the dark green leaves are from last year.

Boy's Mum has shared some of her flowering tobacco plants with me: I've managed to keep the snails off them well enough that most have gotten big and strong and are blooming in a very interesting and attractive way:
I don't think tobacco leaves this small are any good to roll up and smoke--they're purely ornamental.

But how are those 'maters? I think you'll agree they're doing just fine.

The Yokel Effect

2011-06-28T06:30:00.005-04:00

Joe is ignorant.

Kate tells Joe something he didn't previously know.

Joe is embarrassed that he didn't already know that.

Joe resents Kate for inducing this embarrassment.

Joe rejects anything else Kate may have to say.

Joe remains ignorant, but on purpose this time.

Michele Bachmann will try to make her religious dogma into law.

Joe wants religious laws, so he likes Michele Bachmann.

Michele Bachmann is wrong about US history and state policy.

Kate the News Anchor reveals that Michele Bachmann is wrong.

Joe is embarrassed that he didn't know she was wrong.

Joe resents Kate for making him feel embarrassed.

Joe rejects what news anchors say about Michele Bachmann.

Joe votes for Michele Bachmann.

(A Summary of Matt Taibbi's article in Rolling Stone.)

Plants, Pies, and Little Neighbours

2011-06-24T18:01:00.006-04:00

So, WindoPlant is looking happier than it has in months:

This rhubarb and strawberry pie (recipe courtesy of Smitten Kitchen, discovered thanks to my dear Kim is still cooling on the rack RIGHT NOW.

I came across this little fella sleeping in my garden when I came home from the shops yesterday afternoon (and yes, he was breathing--it's always a bit iffy when it comes to London foxes. They're not the healthiest of creatures.)

But These boys live next door and come over to say hi to me almost every day. That's Squidge in the front and Mooney standing behind. They're very sweet. Squidge is a bit simple (he's a fully-grown tom who still chases his tail) and Mooney can be a bit aloof but they both come around right after dinner for a head-scratch. (Before we met the new couple next door, but after the cats started coming around to say hi, we called them Ackee and Saltfish.)

That's all.

Miss Apologist

2011-06-22T06:46:00.005-04:00

I just watched the reel of Miss USA contestants' answers to the question "should evolution be taught in schools?" and wow, it made me sad.

Most of them said yes, but qualified it with some sort of higgledy-wibbledy "and creationism should be taught too, so the child can decide what to believe in." Several made disparaging comments regarding the fact that it is a theory, comments which clearly evidence their ignorance as to what the word "theory" actually means. This is pathetic, but demonstrates not their own idiocy, but the failings of their education systems.

In Fort Mill, in the year 2000 I learned about the theory of evolution in Biology 1. The teacher prefaced the unit with a well-rehearsed speech, one that chills me even now as I remember how directly she had to undermine her own intelligence every year. She looked fleetingly in each child's eyes as she said "this is a theory. I'm required to teach it to you. You are not required to believe it, and you will not be tested on your belief in it. But you need to be aware of it, especially those of you who want to study science in college or work in science when you grow up." She then fielded a number of protestations from the class members who wished to sit out because it was offensive to them. They couldn't, so some just didn't show up for the rest of the week and took a zero for the unit. Most kids, though, didn't care, and sat through the lessons exactly as they would any other lesson.

The trouble was, though, that the explanation in the textbook was weak, confusing, and disjointed. The diagrams didn't make any sense and examples seemed almost deliberately obscure. And all the while students whispered "it's just a theory, it's just a theory." as though this somehow negated it.

I'll admit, when I first learned about the evolution of human beings from an ancestor in common with contemporary apes, I was...not sceptical, not dubious, but somehow offended. I didn't like the idea that my big beautiful brain and fur-free face had a root in something so ugly. I didn't want to be part of such a humiliating lineage. But it nevertheless made sense. And in the end, that's all that mattered, because other ideas didn't.

But what got me was the repeated assertion that this was "just a theory" as though it wasn't a fact, just an idea that a few people believed in. But that's not a theory. An idea that makes sense but hasn't been proven or disproved is a hypothesis. The 45-odd identical young women in the interview reel who wanted to teach "both", side by side seemed to think that the word Theory means unverified claim, much like creationism. The only way evolutionary science could be taught alongside creationism is if no one had ever tried to test the hypothesis of evolution.

See, creationism never made it past the hypothesis stage. It did not hold up under experiment or examination. It was disproved. Evolution, on the other hand, has held up under experiment and examination. It has not been disproved. Does that mean it has been proven? Well, that's not really how the scientific method works. And anyone who has paid attention in science class beyond fourth grade knows that. The best you can hope for, really, is to be not conclusively disproved many, many times. Evolution has passed this scrutiny many many times, so it gets to be a theory--a generally agreed-upon-as-true concept. Creationism, and later its watered-down quasi-evolutionary sneaky-inny concessionary re-try versions have failed under this scrutiny many many times, so it gets to be a crock of bullshit. We know it is false. It has never stood up to reasonable verification measures. It is not a theory. It is wrong.

In answering "it should be taught alongside other theories, like creationism" these young ladies have only actually managed to say, "I don't know what the word theory means, so I'm not qualified to answer this question."

But that's what the system teaches them--so long as teachers can say "it's just a theory" and expect most parents to equate that with saying "it's just this insignificant idea" then they can teach their science classes in peace. In parents' minds no one has actually directly stated "this is the truth. All other ideas are wrong." so they don't raise up to protect their bullshit. Even though the teachers actually have said that. Just from a rather oblique grammatical angle. Evolution is the only explanation for biodiversity and the links between various species that has not been proven false.

But also (!) what is this BS about kids getting the option of believing in what they want to believe if all the cards are laid out on the table? No. Evolution is true whether or not you believe in it. It is belief-proof. You can stand in your living room or sanctuary all day and wave your hands around saying "la la la, I don't believe" but when you break for dinner, your relationship to the chimpanzee in the local zoo is still irrefutable.

School isn't about providing avenues for belief, and it sure as hell isn't about teaching religious fairy stories. It exists to provide young people with the basic knowledge and thinking skills they need to either undertake further education or do a grown-up job. Note, I did not say "critical" thinking skills. Just thinking. You don't get to think critically until at least your junior year of university.

The mere idea of providing a middle schooler with two contradictory ideas of where human beings came from, one which is true but kinda dry and the other which is clearly false (but is nevertheless presented as "as potentially true" as the other) but tells children that they're somehow special out of the entire universe, then leaving them to pick one, is clearly nonsense. Kids are dumb--not just insufficiently informed, but mentally undeveloped. They're not able to think critically or objectively. They just want to feel safe, fed, and special. That's why we don't argue with them or ask them to make choices. We simply present information to them as irrefutable and expect them to absorb it. And they do.

That is why it is so very vital to keep BS like creationism out of schools. Kids are too dumb to realize that their stupidity and credulity are being exploited by adults who want them to believe popular lies in the face of valid evidence to the contrary. Children believe their teachers with a sort of relaxed empiricism that can get them into trouble. (e.g. I'll believe it because someone much smarter than me believes it and appears to have done some research. Therefore whatever the teacher tells me is factual.) If you tell teachers to present evolution and creationism as equally-potentially-true approaches toward explaining some big unknown, you only confuse the simple-minded monkeys in your class. Tell them what actually is true, and let their churches lie to them.

The sad fact is, most of these contestants in some way acknowledged that kids' understanding of evolution is vital to our nation's progress. We can't make advances in medicine or biotech without it, or with a belief that something else is true. How can you hold two such directly conflicting ideas in one head? On the one hand, you can clearly observe the leaps and bounds technology has made since people accepted the Origin of the Species, you can acknowledge that this scientific understanding is vital, but on the other you can say "but I believe something different." I know this is true, but I don't personally believe in it. GlaDOS would explode.

I'll explain it. You believe the theistic lies because you were told them when you were very young, before you were really capable of examining them yourself. You were told them by people you loved and trusted so you never questioned them. And now, fifteen to twenty years later, they've gelled into a bizarre permeable sense-barrier. You can both know a truth and disbelieve in it, not because you have faith, but because you really just haven't thought about it. Or much at all.

Yes, the most important reason to keep creationism out of schools is that, if we allowed it, the dumber kids would turn out just like you, Miss USAirhead.

Spot the Difference!

2011-06-21T07:43:00.001-04:00

Look closely...

April 30, 2011

June 12, 2011

2011-06-21T05:26:00.001-04:00

I saw a documentary recently about the conservation challenge of non-photogenic endangered species, such as the Dominican Chicken (a big frog with tasty legs) which are on the verge of being wiped out (in the case of the Chicken, by over-hunting and an infectious fungus that was probably brought in by a tourist). It's strange--amphibians have been around for millions and millions of years, and even this particular species has been around for ages, but they are so very specifically adapted to their habitats that they're two degrees from extinction at the best of times (well, at least since the industrial revolution). I guess when you have a fairly permeable skin layer protected by a rather pH specific mucus, the slightest environmental change can wreck your defences and cause catastrophe. Like the white perch in Baltimore Harbour--almost all of them have an intestinal infection (that starts at the anus) by midsummer because the bay's acidity changes during fertilizer season, burning through their protective layer right when the algal bloom is reaching its peak. This illness, plus depleted dissolved oxygen levels (courtesy of the opaque slurry of dead algae) prevents many of these little ugly fish from reaching sexual maturity, so spawn counts are lower, which means the animals that eat them are going hungry...but they're not big or fluffy, so no one really cares. Holistic ecology is lost on most people.

I Attended A Quiet, Nerdy Lecture

2011-06-10T14:01:00.006-04:00

and this happened.

Yeah. Protesters. They were upset about AC Grayling's proposed new school, a frou-frou private humanities college that would cost £18,000 a year and offer intensive scholarship to a rather specific student body. Richard Dawkins has agreed to do a few lectures a year there in science, and has made it clear that all of the money he receives for doing them will go to charity. The students don't like the idea of a new private, expensive school in the UK and want Dawkins to refuse to be a part of it on ethical grounds (e.g. the school is too expensive and takes the "best teachers" away from the public schools because it will pay them more.)

The protest lasted about forty-five minutes (the entire duration of which was spent with the audience hurling abuse at them and telling them to sod off), until the back-up police officers arrived, filed in, and escorted them out quietly. The lecture hall was completely packed--about 1,000 asses in seats--and maybe up to four attendees had any sympathy for their concern. The proposed university certainly wasn't the point of the talk or the reason why any of us had shown up. We'd come to hear a bit of give-and-take, perhaps some dorky science jokes from two of our favourite atheists.

In all honesty I got the impression that the whole point of the talk was to give PZ Myers an opportunity to say hi to some of his London readers, and maybe even have a drink with some of us. As it was the police made a point of shunting us and the professors out of the building as quickly as possible so as to avoid any other ugly encounters that they'd then have to deal with. I can't say I blame them, but it was a shame that the asshat brigade prevented what might have been a nice reception.

See, I have absolutely zero sympathy for these kids. Righteous as their anger must undoubtedly feel to them, I grew up in the USA where higher education is considered neither right nor privilege, but investment. A degree represents an investment of time, effort, and money in your personal future. The state does help students pay for it--not with giveaways, typically, but with low-interest loans and scholarships for the best students. This scholarship system may be considered a sort of sliding scale: the degree itself may be achieved either through more effort or more payment, within certain constraints. If the student consistently earns Cs she can still graduate with money, but if she earns As she can pay for it with merit.

This system worked for me: I earned damn fine grades throughout my undergraduate career and left school with only the debt I accrued through housing costs. The state of South Carolina paid my tuition all four years, and USC gave me a pat on the head in the form of the three words Magna, Cum *hehe* and Laude after my qualification. I'm so clever they had to tell me in Latin.

A lot of students started on this, the LIFE scholarship. It's quite simple, really--in the state of South Carolina, if you graduate high school with at least a B average and at least 1100 on your SATs, if you go to a SC university the state will cover your tuition costs, no matter what you study. In order to keep receiving this every semester all you have to do is remain in full-time study and maintain a B (3.0) average. You can even get LIFE if you didn't meet these criteria at the end of high school, but do well in your first few terms of uni. Sadly, though, most students who start on a LIFE lose it for one reason or another. Either their grades slip, or they drop down to part-time, or they transfer out of state, or they get in too much trouble (I think there's something about not getting convicted of felonies) or a variety of other things happen that cause them to not get funded. The state sees them as a failed investment and withdraws, which gives them a choice: either invest in themselves, or do something else.

Beyond this, nearly 40% of all students who start university drop out after two years--a fact that course designers actually depend on, but a huge pain in the ass in every other respect. Yes, third and fourth year modules benefit from small class sizes and intimate, direct discussion and tuition with teachers, but at what cost? The system has to filter through and crush the dreams of thousands of hopefuls every semester.

But let's look at this from a financial standpoint--unless you quit before you start, if you quit after a term you're left with money spent for nothing. Now, if the "state" pays for most of it, then you're only accountable for at most £4,500 per term that you kept it up. As an individual, that's not so bad. But think for a second--40% of all students drop out. That means the big nebulous "state" is accountable for the remainder of the actual cost of failing to educate all of you--a far greater amount per student than what you pay. Now who is that state? Oh right, it's your friends and neighbours. Y'know, me. We have footed the bulk of the cost so you could fart around and do nothing for a couple of years before giving up and moving back in with your mummy. Thanks for nothing. Excuse me, thanks for less than nothing. Thanks for thieving. That's right. We've given universities millions of pounds so you can come out exactly as employable as if you hadn't gone at all.

Yeah, I actually do want you to get something out of your education--a job. I'm depending on you getting a job. We all are. That's what society is built on. We all chip in--for roads, for schools, for hospitals, for common defence--and we all need jobs in order to do our bit. It is in the best interest of the government And the people for me to have a decent-paying job, because it means I can pay my taxes. I can provide my share of the responsibility of keeping my country running.

(And yes, it's even better for the UK for me to have a job, despite the fact that I can't claim unemployment benefits. Even if I'm not mooching off the state, if I'm not earning money I'm not putting anything into it either.)

Say what you want about reasonable taxation, it's there for a reason. It's not going away. Unless you want to form your own militias and let private companies run the trains for maximum profit, you're going to need to ensure that you have a solid government that is trying to represent the interests of the majority of people in your nation.

So the UK accepts that 40% of all people who start uni aren't going to graduate. That's 40% of the money they have chosen to invest in your future that they're counting on going to waste. That's stupid.

A better system is one that recognizes an investment in the students who are most likely to succeed. A system that rewards high grade earners and diligent attenders by lifting the financial burden from them, and encourages people who don't actually want to work hard for an education to get into a more appropriate field quickly. A system wherein individuals earn investment in their potential by proving that they have it.

In South Carolina I made a number of my fellow students unhappy with this assertion--that is, that I supported the financial arrangements I had signed up for by going to a local school. "I lost my scholarship, so now I have to work to pay for school, which interferes in my ability to go to school and study, so my grades have suffered even more" is a big one. And a huge f'ing crock. No. You don't have to. If you actually gave a crap about the education itself, if you didn't have the grades to start with or lost the good ones you had, you could take out a student loan. If you'd rather work for money than study, that's your own concern, but don't make it out like the state ought to keep paying for you to not attend school. The state has a responsibility to promote the general welfare of the people as effectively as it can. Your empty chair in the Economics 201 room is not counted as "people".

What loans and merit-based scholarships do is create not a two-tiered finance-based system, but a multi-tiered interest-based system. For kids who want to learn and are willing to put in the effort, the state supports that education. For the huge numbers of people who don't want to spend more time in a classroom learning abstract ideas and debating philosophy, there are opportunities to learn skills for a lower cost (both in terms of money and time) that can help you find good employment. For people who seek neither education nor skills, there are jobs available sweeping floors and digging ditches. Some people like that. Who am I to argue?

My point is you do not have a right to higher education. Your state has given itself an obligation to ensure that the most capable individuals can get into careers that on some level benefit everyone--even if the only benefit it provides is a taxable salary. If you can pay tax and save lives, so much the better. Get off your damn high horse of middle class entitlement for a second and recognize that it's not all about you, and never was. Your state has been foolishly squandering money on you for years, and they've learned their mistake. The majority of people do not need higher education--they need stable jobs. Most jobs don't actually require a BA-level education to be performed well, but a BA has become the benchmark of competence thanks to you pushing higher education on everyone. Thanks to your "education is a right" bollocks, kiddos, your education has become valueless.

If you want someone to be upset at, don't wave your hands around at academics who want to set up their own private schools. They're not the problem--they're just a symptom. The real problem is that the MA has become the new BA, and the BA has become the new high school diploma, but people still give credence to the idea that the universe was built on purpose in a week by a bearded humanoid who loves them.

You show me nation full of university graduates and I'll show you a nation with a higher ceiling.

Second-Year Growth

2011-05-29T07:18:00.005-04:00

I discovered at the pub last night that a pleasant but hardly close acquaintance of mine has been following the progress of my garden on the ol' Book of Face. Flattered and a bit taken aback at this knowledge, I nevertheless happily engaged in a good twenty minutes or so of Plant Talk with her and had a lovely time. It seems that since this is my second growing season, my amateur gardening peers assume I must have learnt something by now. And I have! I've learned, for the most part, how I've done things wrong.

Take for instance my tomato plants last year. It didn't bother me that they were three metres tall and had more foliage than my forsythia and my holly combined. They were big and happy and gave me a lot of fruit, much of which never made it into the house (well, I mean it did, but it was already in a belly at that point.) The fruits were delicate and delicious, and I enjoyed them thoroughly. But I did a lot of things wrong.
I forgot to water them, okay? Summer rainfall is unpredictable here, so you never can be sure just how much rain is getting to the plants' roots. I'd see it rain and think "I don't need to water them today--thanks, sky!" and go about my business. But unfortunately, due to the angle the rain came in at, the semi-protective cove I carved out of the hedge for them, and (as the plants got bigger) the canopy of leaves the tomatoes themselves grew, most rainwater missed the roots entirely. So when I'd come out the next day and the stems would be sagging before my eyes I'd rush around to give them a drink.

This causes problems, I discovered--if you let them get dry, then suddenly dump a bucket of water on them, they slorp it up too fast. While this isn't really a bad thing when the plant is young, once fruits begin to grow, a period of dryness makes the tomato skins less elastic--meaning that when the plant suddenly injects water into them, they split. For un-broken fruit you must sustain your water supply. That didn't really dawn on me. They still tasted great, but they didn't last as long.
Another thing I didn't really realize until later in the season is if you stop fertilizing the soil on a regular basis, the fruit becomes tasteless and the colour is less vibrant. (see also "plant leaves make their own canopy which keeps water off roots"--water which contains liquid fertilizer). They do like my tasty high-potash tomato food from Tesco.

A third thing, this time involving growth. The plant doesn't really exist to make as many fruits as possible. That's not its overall priority. The plants want to be big and lush and eat all the sunshine they can find. Last year I didn't mind this, but I did something quite strange for no particular reason that taught me a lesson. I planted 3 tomatoes in 9" pots and the other 7 in the ground. The 3 in the pots stayed little (they maxed out at about 3') and were more prone to nutrient-retention problems, but they flowered first, fruited first, and sustained regular, if smaller crops of tomatoes throughout the entire season. The 7 in the ground (in the hedge, that became the hedge) got much taller (12' or more) and much, Much leafier, and produced more tomatoes, but did so later, and by the end of the warm season they all had at least one cluster that had not ripened. It seemed like they put far more effort into overall growth than fruit growth, more than likely because they had bigger, stronger root structures that could support unchecked growth of that kind.

It's worth noting that I didn't mind them getting huge and taking over the hedge at all--mostly because I had completely scalped the hedge to make room for them, and without the vines I would have probably caused several awkward "er, nice jammies" encounters with my neighbours.
But yes, at least someone out there has been enjoying my failures and occasional bright spots of success in the yard. Check out the slime trail left by one of my many tomato seedling murderers. I caught this one and gave him a fling at the fence.
My courgettes are flowering and have tiny immature squashes deep inside.
Two of my rosemary shrubs have been eaten by something or other but the third is happy and healthy.

The peony has finished its all-too-brief show but the azalea is still going and my miniature rose is just getting started. (teeny tiny rose! It would fit in a salad bowl)

The sage went all powdery and died, which is something my landlord says happens frequently. I have some sort of wall-climber that has tiny flowers that the bumblebees absolutely adore.
The apple tree is full of tiny orbs.
I hacked the fuchsia back almost to the ground in March and it's full of leaves again, ready to go. The lemon balm is taking over, but I don't mind. Apparently it is a useful mosquito repellent. (It does smell like citronella so I'm not surprised. I wonder what would happen if you mashed it into a small bowl of water and heated it?) I have two types of mint (one brightly-flavoured, one more subdued) that are both doing well, but I'm having to pull their little sprigs out of the path. They're growing in pots but that is apparently not a restriction. The Big Pink Plant finished blooming and has settled down for the summer.
The Japanese Maple is so richly red it's almost purple and the lettuces are covered in aphids.

The Hosta is happy and no longer looks like a city of the future. My garden has far more aphids and whiteflies than last year. I don't really know why but I have a few hunches--I grew tulips this year and by the end of March they had aphids all over them. I wonder if they like laying eggs on tulips. They certainly like laying eggs on lettuces, but then again everything likes to eat lettuce. Snails, aphids, flies, cats...I've decided to just leave the lettuces as a herbaceous sacrifice to the neighbourhood.

A note I just sent to my MP

2011-05-06T12:00:00.001-04:00

Dear Ms. Ruddock,

This letter is intended to share with you my views regarding the Shoreditch High Street Overground "toll booth" and its impact on Lewisham residents. I don't know if you're aware that Shoreditch High Street Station was moved into Zone 1 in 2009 thanks to pressure from National Rail over concerns that the Overground would hurt their ticket sales. Because of this, your constituents must pay £11 extra every week just to pass through this station to get to our offices--a charge which commuters from other areas of zones 2 and 3 are not subjected to.

As the Shoreditch Toll Booth only affects commuters coming into town from our neck of the woods, I believe this is a regional equality issue that warrants your concern. We've been monopolized by National Rail for too long--and now rather than force it to compete with the less-convenient but lower-priced Overground as intended, TfL has caved to financial pressure from this for-profit enterprise, prevented the people from having a money-saving option, and undermined their own initiative to reduce traffic.

For every other region, the Overground costs £21 a week, but for us it's £32. If we didn't pay London taxes maybe a surcharge to get into town would make sense, but since we do, pricing us out of the Overground network is clearly unfair.

When the Overground was being built we were told that it was intended to help reduce congestion in the Tube and the central stations by providing an orbital service for the outer zones. But because of National Rail's shady dealing it's the same price for me to get to my office in Angel via London Bridge as Highbury & Islington, so I squeeze onto the Northern line every morning. We have no option but to pay for Zone 1, so we might as well use the faster routes straight through it. The few occasions when I've had cause to catch the Overground it's been practically empty--and rightly so.

Once construction begins in earnest on London Bridge Station rail travel in our region is going to be a nightmare. Surely TfL can see wisdom in keeping as many people as possible out of that! And with the Olympics coming up it seems contradictory to our city's best interests to Not offer a real incentive for locals to stay out of the city centre. We're all used to overcrowding--avoiding the tourists is not an effective incentive!

A solution that has been proposed to mediate the conflicting interests of National Rail and southeasterners is Shoreditch could behave like Zone 1 if you enter or exit there (the City is technically within walking distance, so fair enough) but if you only pass through without getting off your train, it remains Zone 2 as originally intended. This would not be difficult to programme, and it would encourage Zone 2 workers like my partner and I to go out of our way to lighten the load on London Bridge.

Moreover, Ben and I don't earn much, so the £1,000 per year this small change could save our household is significant. And as I'm well aware of National Rail's pay and neglect scandals, regular price hikes and service cuts, and the fact that they get our tax money regardless of the quality of their service, you'll have a hard time convincing me they deserve that grand more than we do.

Please help your constituents make ends meet and unclog the Tube by making the Overground serve its purpose. The Shoreditch High Street Toll Booth extorts the South East and should be eliminated.

Thank you for your time.

It's About Balance

2011-05-04T07:17:00.009-04:00

Public. Private. Who decides? Who pays? What is appropriate? I'd like to touch on a few big industries that have a lot of leeway in modern Britain: the publicly funded, publicly run Arts Council, the publicly funded, privately-run Rail Union, and the privately-funded, privately-run pain in the ass that is Big Telecom.

I am a theatre professional. Well, I would be if I was employed. I am a highly educated theatre-y person. (An MA in theatre and a sockful of nickels might get you a loaf of bread.) Maybe my opinion on this matter has the potential to be modified by employment, but for now, I have a thing or two to say about state-funded art.

It's a bad idea.

The UK government established the Arts Council in 1940 to try and give artists an income--to keep the vagrants off the streets, essentially. The arts council was founded on the notion that artists are otherwise useless to society and it would less unsanitary to fund them to do something than to have them begging. (Okay, I'm making some of that up. The arts council was developed to preserve and promote British culture, which is a valid enough enterprise, 'cos let's face it, the British don't have a whole lot else going for them now that all their primary industries have moved to countries that don't get their panties in a wad about workplace safety and living wages. And unlike Hawaii, British tourism can't just sustain itself on sunshine and pretty women.)

Back to the point. Many theatres in the UK would collapse if state funding was pulled from them. Tourism would be threatened. Culture would be compromised. An entire generation of artists would fade into obscurity. It would be a catastrophe.

This is unfortunate, because honestly the last thing art needs is tax money, and the best thing for the industry is for the state to turn away from it.

(You traitor! Arrrrg! No wonder no one will hire you!) What tax funding has done to theatre is allow the general population to have a voice in what types of arts programming get funding. And guess what. 90% of the general population does not think that "art for art's sake" is a worthwhile use of their money. I for one don't. You want to take my hard-earned (non-existent) cash and give it to some idiot so he can poop on the floor? Film herself scraping off her fingernails and soaking her bleeding fingers in milk? Tie herself into an awkward position and paint the walls with her teeth? No. That's a waste of money. Tax revenue must be used for the public good.

So the opposite has happened. The only theatres, music groups, and art programmes that get money are ones that have some sort of outreach motive. At-risk youth theatre. Music therapy for the mentally ill. Art in hospitals. History museums.

This is fine. No, really. Well, sorta. I have no particular beef with nice people providing art-based social services. I would never do it myself, as I've only ever seen it backfire, but surely some good has come from bringing a joyful noise into classrooms and shelters. Sure, half the time the troubled teens are just shouting "fuck off, little miss do-gooder" and it's impossible to quantify the effectiveness of cello music on coma patients, but I'm sure that on some level it's all making life a little bit more liveable for someone (and not just the bleeding-heart practitioners themselves).

But the availability of free money for the right kind of art has crippled arts development in every other sector, because every organization that could be doing something cool is instead flopping around like sun-baked fish, desperately modifying their programming and mission statement in the hopes of getting picked up for funding. People and groups that have no business influencing children and prisoners are out there, compromising their vision (and distressing toddlers) because there's no other money available to support creative expression.

The private sector may call for a commission occasionally--a new sculpture for the lobby, a cubist portrait of the founder--but because of the pervasive influence of the Democratised Aesthetic, unless a submission can demonstrate its Community Outreach potential, very few corporate managers will risk investing in art. It's just bad PR.

Back in the day--long before my day--artists sought patrons. Wealthy individuals and companies paid artists to be their entertainment-on-demand. Yes, the artist had to produce work that the patron appreciated, but these sorts of relationships were varied and could lead to quite interesting, diverse outcomes. The upshot of all this was that exceptional artists could create art that pleased the aesthetic and interests of their particular niche, and if nobody else liked it, it didn't matter. Consider the Shakespeare histories that made sure to portray ancestral competing claimants to the throne as evil, or the architects who told George IV that the onion-domed And crenellated Royal Pavilion he wanted for Brighton would be just beautiful (and very accurately Chinese).

But time has moved on, expectations have been raised, and theatre has gotten more expensive to produce. Meanwhile companies have merged and streamlined, grown and expanded until entire industries have come to exist under one corporate umbrella. The only companies that can afford to sponsor arts organizations are such high-profile institutions that they can't risk being too controversial. Even innocuous, good-idea helpful patronage, when it reaches the ears of the wrong community, leads to boycotts and protests in the streets (or did no one else notice the Teabaggers flapping their arms around outside Home Depot for supporting GLAAD?) Big corporations that decide to support the arts have to be very, very careful that they are investing in programmes that make them look good across the board.

Theatres that already are big corporations have to make shows that will please everyone, or at least not offend anyone.

Which results in porridge. Bland, colourless, gloppy, saccharin sweet porridge.

Germany does something different. In German culture banks, investors, and huge monolithic corporations have adopted a fashion where it's hip to fund a theatre. They still have something resembling that patronage system, and in a lot of cases, the money that it takes to run an arts organization is hardly a blip on the corporation's ledger--at least, it's not a big enough concern that the funding body takes any great care to monitor the theatre's output. This occasionally leads to them paying performers to masturbate onstage to a house of empty seats, but it allows for funded creative experiment--artists getting paid a living wage to try new things, develop new ideas, and push the envelope without worrying if their actions promote awareness of Sidcup's recycling programme.

It's like that terrible waste of beautiful puppetry that's gone from nauseating the West End to annoying Spielberg's viewers: when you burden a show-horse with a plough, you wind up with both a broken horse and a poorly turned field. Art has been crippled by its failed attempt to Do Good. Art is not good. It is not bad. It is art, and if you try and give it a social purpose, you wind up with the abomination that is War Horse.

----

But let's look at the flip side for a second. What happens when publicly-funded organizations get to do whatever they want with no accountability to anyone but themselves, despite the fact that they affect everyone? When they don't have to do good, even though they should? I am referring, naturally, to the Rail Maritime and Transport (RMT) union.

The Tube. It is London's life force--an arterial system that provides almost every neighbourhood with workers, taxpayers, and the occasional vagrant. Like theatre it is also paid for with a combination of tax revenue and ticket sales. But unlike theatre, in the past year transit prices have gone up twice, services have been reduced, and the union has gone on strike at least four times, effectively shutting the system down and putting an undue burden on the separate unions of the buses, suburban rail, the Overground, the river, taxis, and the highway. Theatres tried that--nobody showed up and eventually the theatres closed.

RMT are striking for what at first sounds like reasonable causes--safety, hours, wages, job security. Fair enough, right?

Except. Except they don't really have a leg to stand on. Tube employees' base salary is £15,000 higher than any other transit workers'. More money is sluiced by the state into the Tube than into any other system--into maintenance, employee benefits, maintaining jobs, and line development. Particularly now that the Olympics are rapidly coming closer, ensuring that the city has a safe, reliable, attractive public transit system has been declared utterly vital. They are getting as much money as anyone can afford.

And we live in the Future. The city also has a lovely train service called the Docklands Light Railway, which is every four year old boy's favourite thing on earth for one very important reason: he can sit up front and pretend to drive. The DLR is essentially a large network of robots that functions quite well almost entirely without human involvement. It's on time, it's safe, and it runs itself.

Sure, in the evenings it's a good idea to have transit employees on board to ensure that when drunks fall onto the tracks, the machine doesn't carry on without heeding their plight. But under daily circumstances, drivers, door operators, and signalmen are more trouble than they're worth. Unfortunate to employment rates? Sure. But what is better for commuters--employing train employees to do an okay job, or having machines do a very efficient job?

This kind of gimmick of course makes transit employees very, very angry. And to an extent I understand them--why should people lose their jobs to machines, just because machines do them better and without needing to buy food or nappies or pay mortgages or take sick days? We've had to face the crushing truth that computers and machines work better than we do since the industrial revolution. As we innovate ourselves out of usefulness, we must take a moment to ask--why do we cling to the notion that a task that is better and more cheaply performed by a computer programme should still be a career? No one seems to mourn the obsolescence of the scullery maid or the lamplighter. And while home-made cakes do taste better, I have a hard time believing that the DLR is somehow inferior without that human touch. If a machine has been made to streamline the inefficiencies of human performance at any task, surely this is an indicator that the best human operation leaves room for improvement.

So far, the rail unions have kept the machines from completely eliminating their jobs, but this success has empowered them to take more bold moves, which may get them into trouble. Their regular, crippling strikes over ticket office layoffs (the computerized system works better, faster, more fairly, speaks 17 languages, doesn't yell at you for waking it up, and doesn't pull the shade at 4:45pm) and their planned strikes over the legitimate firing of two employees have endeared the soulless DLR to Londoners more and more over the past year.

----

But what about private companies who have never done good, have never had to do good, but keep getting in the way regardless? I'm referring, of course, to phone companies and net neutrality.

Why does the phone company think it is owed something in this digital age? We have always paid for phone service--it's not like the entire history of telephone operation has been some sort of philanthropy on their part--but now that a video phone call can be handled for free and with minimal bandwidth occupation on the Internet companies like BT are determined to get their just deserves. Courts are filled every day with phone lawyers and lobbyists doing whatever they can to prevent companies like Skype from letting people circumvent their communication toll. Just because it Can be done for free doesn't mean it Should, surely.

The problem is the people who would add a surcharge to free services so as to hold onto their profit margin are convinced that the Internet is a closed system with a speed limit that can and should be enforced. Despite the truth that the interwebs just expand as new information enters them, and so long as people keep buying servers there's no reason the net won't just grow indefinitely, they are trapped in a 1980's version of the world where a town's long-distance jacks were limited and had to be handled by an operator. The extents they're going to now to impose their analogue fees on the digital world are akin to priests raving that, despite all evidence that a skilled surgeon removed your infected appendix safely, prayer actually saved your life. Get with the program. Manual telephone operation and religion have been dead for years, but for some stupid reason they won't stop kicking or demanding our money. You've had your day! Just let go already! Better, faster, smarter and cheaper systems have replaced you--namely computers and soap. The reason we're not paying you is because you shouldn't be paid anymore. You want a job? Invent a new service we can't live without. Don't demand that we keep paying you for a service nobody needs that you don't even provide.

----
So. I think it comes down to: art should not be public, transit should not be private, and anyone who tries to force consumers to pay twice for internet and internet services should be shot. I already pay my monthly net subscription to BE AND a trumped-up "line rental" fee to the privately-owned BT--don't try and charge me for using Skype because I'm not paying your free-money long-distance fee for a piece of software to automatically connect me to my mom. I'm paying you for internet access. What I do with it is my business.

A Heartfelt, if Unwarranted, Open Thank-You Note

2011-04-27T06:28:00.003-04:00

Dear HR Department Representatives of the Six or So Companies who have Sent Me Rejection Letters,

Thank you for your note. I very much appreciate knowing that you received my application and reviewed it to some degree before deciding against it. Over the past two months I have sent out upwards of 50 job applications but have only received about ten confirmations that I even did so. While I am of course a little disappointed that I was not selected for an interview with your company, I am absolutely elated that you took the time to tell me. I am seriously not joking. It makes me feel so much better to hear a solid no than to just sit and wait, confident my application probably was discarded without so much as a glance but still nagged by the niggling hope that maybe your office is just really, really inefficient. It took the BBC 4 months to send me a rejection letter--who's to say you're not all like that? And then where would I be if I accepted a job? Weeks after I accepted a job on a sailboat, which I thoroughly enjoyed, I received four calls from other companies--boats, offices, and even the circus--offering me interviews and expressing interest. Not fair! I have no patience for false hope. I have more respect for companies who tell me no in a timely manner than for those who string me along or simply say nothing. It's one thing if they cover their tracks from the outset with a quick "due to the high volume of applications we receive we are unable to reply individually to every letter, so if you haven't heard from us in a week please assume you were not selected for interview." blurb on the job description itself. That's a reasonable stance, particularly if you have over 50 applications for each position. That quick line of text gives an unsuccessful applicant closure. But the ones that just say nothing, particularly in the arts--that can mean anything. Seriously, with flaky artsy types at the helm, no response could mean no, maybe, yes, or even where are you, we've been paying you for six weeks. So seriously, the clear concise and timely rejection letter is a courtesy I appreciate.

warm regards,

One of the Thousands of Applicants You'll Never Meet

Cool Events I've Come Across

2011-04-24T10:23:00.005-04:00

What's that? I do believe that's a Thames clipper coming about after having just passed through the drawn Tower Bridge.

Oh, and what's that? I believe I witnessed London Henge.

And that is a very mean swan.

Jardin Entr'Acte, avec les photos

2011-04-24T06:54:00.007-04:00

Well, my tulips are pretty much done for the year. The dark purple tulips are still clinging onto solvency, but they'll dry out by Wednesday I'm sure. I've cut the stems back but left the foliage so hopefully they'll be strong for next spring. Thanks, Tulips! You really brightened my winter. See you back soon.

The tomatoes are getting bigger but they're not big or strong enough yet for me to stop worrying about them. I probably shouldn't have put them outside when I did but I was tired of hauling watering cans up to the attic, which is now hot and stifling without the skylights open. A fox dug one of the Gardeners Delights up in what appeared to be an aborted burial for a six-inch piece of a mouldy baguette. Bizarre. The plant was uprooted but not damaged and seems to be springing back.

I've had to move my growing operations up the garden somewhat as the huge ugly sycamore in my neighbours' garden now has enormous limbs overshadowing the end of the yard. Irksome, as I already have a big ugly holly doing that on the opposite side. I'm sure my neighbours wouldn't give a flying hoot if I lopped the branch off, but as I have no car and the city does not provide garden waste removal, I have no idea what I'd do with it. The idea of "chop it up and burn it" has a certain appeal, and there's no law preventing me doing just that, but I'd like to get a chiminea or sturdy metal trash can before I tried that. The idea of chopping both of those trees down and burning them is even more appealing, figuring I swept the garden yesterday and it is already again covered in nasty sticky tree pollen sacs and pointy painful stupid ugly holly leaves.

The Big Pink Plant has pink flowers now but it's not as showy as it was last year, probably because I pruned it quite severely after it dropped its blossoms last May. It was scraggly and lopsided and kinda sad-looking without the flowers, but I guess that's the trade-off. It also appears to have two cousins in the garden that are also blooming, but with white flowers of the same shape. Pleasing. I dug up some photos from 2010 to demonstrate just how much less floofy it is now.

Big Pink Plant Whole 2010

Big Pink Plant Detail 2010

Big Pink Plant Whole, 2011

Big Pink Plant Detail 2011

Just this morning the Azalea has begun to bloom, and the peony is about to. Yay! Also as of this morning I have visible seedlings for my bell peppers and beefsteak tomatoes. Go little plants!

Peony bud! Eeek!

Azalea! White flowers are hard to photograph.

----

I have an interview with another temp agency on Tuesday, so hopefully I'll start getting somewhere soon.

The couple that bought Malcolm and Simon's house sounds like they're installing shelving. They smoke some stinky brand of cigarettes, which is disappointing--the Polish woman on the other side smokes something that smells nice after it has diffused a bit in the night air. Yesterday we happened to see the new dude bring in a set of golf clubs. There goes the neighbourhood.

Ancient Wisdom, or Fear of Change?

2011-04-23T12:29:00.005-04:00

Why do people feel the need to justify the actions and attitudes of the present against documents from the past? The Bible, the Qu'ran, the Constitution, the company mission statement...all referred to constantly by people to prove that they're right, that they're good, that they're striving to attain some well-established ideal. I don't understand.

The Constitution is a big one for me. I don't understand the reverence afforded the Founding Fathers, a bunch of frustrated men whose primary goal was to set up a country that would be Not England after years of colonial oppression. I don't get why people hold up the Bill of Rights as though it's some sort of scripture, perfect and unthinkable to modify, despite the fact that it is comprised of the first ten corrections to a distinctly flawed original document. Why do we hold old writings and rules in a better light than contemporary? Why do we convince ourselves that the values of the ancients are somehow superior, nobler, despite the fact that society has been constantly progressing since the time of writing?

I think the Constitution should be reviewed every year by a randomly selected body of poli sci professors. Once a year they sit down and read the rules and say "okay, does this one still make sense? Is this still a good idea? Could we rephrase it to be more clear? Could we replace it with something more applicable? Should we change this to something that more accurately reflects the best interests of everyone in the nation, not just the white christian ones?" The good ones, keep. The ones that have already been amended, or the ones that are discriminatory or perpetuate inequity get struck. Like the 18th Amendment--it was repealed. Surely that means the 18th should be kicked out and women's suffrage should move up a space. Indeed, why can't women's suffrage just be added to the 15th? What's wrong with modifying the document itself, instead of eternally adding to it? If you're amending it, clearly the document is not sacrosanct. Why do you wish only to fill in the white space at the end? You can keep the first one on file, but don't use it if it's no longer useful.

As for laws that may suck, why should people have the right to wave guns around or not have to give evidence against themselves? Why should the government reserve the right to quarter soldiers in people's homes in wartime? Is it really a good idea to not re-try acquitted cases if new evidence comes to light?

(I'd like to take a moment to consider the right to bear arms. Regardless that its original phrasing intended to state that the people have the right to form militias and defend themselves from tyranny, the right to have a weapon doesn't actually give you the right to use it. If you use your gun on someone in a non-defensive act, it's a crime. Likewise, if you use your gun on someone in an act that you believe to be defensive but turns out to be unnecessary, it's a crime. The only time it's okay to use your gun for its designed purpose is if someone else is using their gun for its designed purpose on you and you'd prefer they didn't. That's just weird and pointless. Kinda like the christian "god is three distinct people at once while at the same time just one dude" argument. Weird, bullshit, and pointless.)

But why do we constantly re-interpret the presumed-noble intent of the written edict, when we could just write something better? We give new meanings to the Constitution and scripture all the time to reflect current thinking, despite what it actually says. Like the current dispute between godbotherers and halfway intelligent people over the first amendment. The godbotherers like to construe it to mean that the government won't dictate religion, but may still behave in a religious manner. Whereas sane people figure it means that the government is a secular body that must not have anything at all to do with religion. If the law as written can be misconstrued, and in particular if it may be misconstrued to repress people or impose discriminatory values on them, it must be re-written. More specifically, if circumstances progress and the world grows up and we realize that a particular law is outdated or represents a view that is no longer universally viewed as just, laws must be updated to reflect--not just the views of the vocal, but the logical, objective truth.

As logic stands now, so long as adults of sound mind consent to an action, provided that action does not affect non-consenting parties, it is no business of anyone else to intervene or even regulate it. But back-assward busybodies nevertheless believe it is their right and obligation to impose their narrow world views behind everyone's doors, so laws remain on the books--some of them utterly unenforceable because federal laws contradict them--that ban perfectly reasonable behaviours because religiosos are holding out for the day the federal ban will go away.

Just as it is unacceptable for religion to control private behaviour and thought by scaring children into believing they are always being watched and their minds are always being read, it is not acceptable for the state to pass laws against doing as one pleases provided it doesn't harm anyone else or break or take their stuff. This is reasonable and just and appropriate. But it would require a complete re-write of everything. I'm okay with that. I don't hold the law as sacred. I believe history is recorded to be learnt from, not to be repeated or maintained. Yes, we know how things were 200 years ago in this country. That doesn't indicate that that's how we need to stay. The People at large don't give a whoop what we used to be. Standing up in front of Congress and saying "well for 200 years the US was ruled by and for christianity so we better keep it that way" is akin to a representative in Israel standing up and saying "well for the past thousand years we didn't have a country here so we better give it back." History is not a mandate. What things were is not necessarily what things oughtta be.

The decline of the prevalence of religion in the developed world (i.e. Europe) crossfades clearly with the advent of useful medical science. Religion has been steadily losing its grip on government, education, nursing, and daily life ever since the discovery of penicillin. As soon as it was discovered that antibiotics and sanitation were far more reliable than prayer people became disillusioned, and rightly so. (Every time someone's life is saved by a complicated surgical procedure and it's called a 'miracle' a skilled surgeon sheds a tear.) It's downright rude to attribute to your imaginary friend what was clearly the work of human beings--human beings who, incidentally, only became able to develop surgical techniques and medicines by disobeying the directives of the church. Indeed, George Eliot mentioned in Middlemarch that even at her time in small country towns the populace was disinclined to trust a religious doctor.

But it goes beyond that. Now that we have video and audio recording technology, quick and easy transport connections around the globe, and instantaneous news coverage of all planetary events which affect people, it's become incredibly difficult for anyone to insulate themselves from the fact that bad shit happens everywhere. How can a sensible person thank Jeebus for curing them of a nasty stomach bug while simultaneously aware that 28,000 people were wiped out by a tsunami--some instantly, but many slowly and in pain, while others are now left to deal with the loss and the battered survivors? Who besides a narcissist can honestly thank god for curing them of anorexia while millions starve due to farm subsidies and trade agreements on top of changing weather patterns? What arrogant freak still thinks there's something out there, in control of the universe, who loves them and gives a flying shitball where their puppy is? How Dare you be religious?

Every catastrophe, every plague, every public outcry is not a time to question the motives of your imaginary friend of choice, but an opportunity to fix something--namely, the structures, traditions, and protocols that were in place that allowed this to happen. Religion exists to restrict the functionality of the state, education, love, science, and medicine and its finally dawned on people that it's costing lives, jobs, equality and happiness. Government is likewise hobbled when its base laws, which may have appeared clear, fair, and appropriate in the religion-crippled culture of 200 years ago, were written for a different, larger world--a world where you could pretend that your way of life was the best and didn't need to change the rules just because they were wrong.

"Because that's what the ancients did" is not a justification for any action. "Because we've always sold Walkmen" does not keep your electronics shop open, even if it was founded in 1987. "Because they thought it was a good idea in 1787" does not justify the US's continued use of the inherently-undemocratic electoral college voting system. Times Change, and old documents and old ways of doing things must be respectfully put aside. Filed, stored, not lost, not forgotten, but not perpetuated. That which we do must be tailored to the world we live in Now, and when what we're doing now is no longer relevant, it too must be archived.

If it's old enough to be sacred, it's clearly out of date.

Southeast London Buttermilk Biscuits

2011-04-23T06:42:00.006-04:00

My adapted recipe. Doing dry measures with a scale just makes so much more sense than with cups.

Start with a cup of milk. Add a tablespoon or so of chardonnay vinegar and let it sit for about five minutes. If you don't have chardonnay vinegar, use regular vinegar or a slightly larger amount of lemon juice, but chardonnay vinegar is best. Steer clear of balsamic or apple cider vinegar, and whatever you do, don't waste your time looking for buttermilk in London. It's not there. Then give it a quick stir—it should be thick.

Then:

Single recipe. Doubling may or may not require exactly the same amount of buttermilk, depending on whether or not Mars is in retrograde.

250 g plain flour
85 g butter—frozen, grated like cheese.
¼ tsp bicarbonate of soda
1 tbsp baking powder
1 tsp salt

Tools:
cheese grater
big bowl
sieve for flour. Sifters are dumb.
scale and other measuring devices
whatever baking pans your landlady left you
clean wooden counter-top. If you have Formica counter-tops, have your kitchen re-appointed before continuing.

See what I didn't include there? A spoon. Yeaaaah.

Preheat your crappy-ass oven to gas mark 8, otherwise known as the “who needs eyebrows?” setting. Due to the nature of your crappy-ass oven, you'll have to rotate your ungreased cookie sheets at least once to ensure the ones in the back don't burn and the ones in the front actually get cooked, so you'll let all the heat out and they won't rise properly. If your oven has a window, watch the ones in the back rise beautifully for the first five minutes, then start to fall when the temperature drops. How like life.

If you'd rather have biscuits that rise nicely, buy an electric oven, install it, and set it to 450 F, 230 C, or self-cleaning mode. Or try to jerry-rig some sort of lazy Susan type device on the top rack. Might work. Refrain from using duct tape or plastic components, particularly if you're baking at night, so as to avoid waking up the whole damn neighbourhood when you burn your kitchen down.

Working with your hands, mix the dry ingredients. Add the butter last, in small handfuls, breaking up any clumps that form as you go. Make sure the butter is nice and incorporated throughout the flour mixture before you add the faux buttermilk but pull your hands out while it's still cold. Add only as much buttermilk as necessary—this amount will change based on the humidity and the movements of Saturn—to make the dough stick together without becoming gloppy. Incorporate only as much as you have to. Do not knead. Scrape the biscuit-worth of dough off your fingers. Dump out on a hella well-floured countertop—use your sieve to snow out a nice even layer—and pat into something resembling a circle, a little over half an inch thick. Do not roll out or pat to less than a half inch in thickness, as the biscuits will come out flat and lame. Pressing straight down, use a 2 inch-diameter biscuit cutter to hack the dough into rough circles, or whatever shape they wind up as. Instead of re-forming the offcuts into another cut-able disc, just throw them on the pan. You're not gonna serve them to the f'ing queen and everybody loves offcuts. Bake for 10-20 minutes, depending on the lunar phase, and remove when most of them are golden brown on top.

Yields about 8 good-sized biscuits, plus another biscuit or two worth of offcuts. I promise this is preferable to 10 biscuits, 2 of which are puck-esque.

Serve with apricot jam, orange marmalade, mozzarella and sliced tomatoes, eggs, baked beans, black pudding, or whatever you have laying around. They'll probably go well.

If you get a chance, serve them alongside a basket of scones and thumb your nose at your friends and family by proving that no, they are not the same. There's nothing particularly wrong with scones, but biscuits they ain't.

Thoughts, Tulips, and new desktop background

2011-04-21T07:51:00.008-04:00

Since I began painting my house back in October (or was it longer ago? Did I paint my dining room so I wouldn't have to write my dissertation? Oh memory, you fail me so speedily these days.) I've been addicted to audiobooks. While I'm still just as literate as ever, and my eyesight has not failed, I have found a joy in taking in a story with my ears that I never before knew I could. I started with the light and silly Sookie Stackhouse novels, perfectly narrated by a delightfully southern professional voice actress, but I ran out of those before the painting bug left me so I sought quickly for something else.

Relief from the silence (and constant shrick-shrick of the roller) came in the form of LibriVox.org, which provided me with classics read by such an interesting variety of volunteers that I felt I might never grow bored with even the dullest of prose. I started to seek out texts read by my favourites, regardless of what they were, and discovered that I actually could tolerate Jane Eyre, and Finished it this time. I've completed more of Jane Austen's canon than I ever knew existed--I started with Sense & Sensibility, revisited Pride & Prejudice, and clomped through Persuasion before enjoying some of her short stories and hilarious essays. (Give The History of England a go--it's just a short thing and I think she wrote it while still a teenager. It's great.)

I'm currently halfway through Middlemarch, though I nearly gave up after a series of unfortunately-voiced readers left me bored and annoyed. (thick Italian accent with confusing phrasing, followed by thick Indian accent with guesswork inflection, followed by thick Ohio accent with inexcusably poor pronunciation. urgh.) So I'm taking a quick break from that and enjoying a professionally-read version of Brideshead Revisited from the library. As Brideshead was not published until 1945 it's got another 22 years before the LibriVox team can get their claws on it. I hope the internet hasn't gotten mouldy before then.

Anyway, some pictures. I think the hosta would make for a good default desktop background.

Two peppermint-flavoured double tulips. The pink stripes turned purple before they passed.

Bluebell with evergreen flowering shrub.

dark tulips with sunshine. mmm.

peppermint-coloured tulip beginning to curl up.

Chive flower beginning to emerge from bud. Yes, I take pictures of my onions.

Hosta, leaf almost entirely unfurled now.

More of the same.

Invasive tulip peeking, with aphid. They just seemed to hang out in them without actually hurting anything. Odd. I still smushed them when I saw them, as they were a nuisance to my tomatoes all last year.

I thought this looked like a supernova against the night sky.

The last flower-leaf of this plant to open, surrounded by older leaves that have faded to yellow. As of now they're all green, save this one, which is yellow.

Tulip Time!

2011-04-06T09:00:00.004-04:00

So today is the warmest, sunniest day yet of the spring, and my tulips sure realized it fast. I came out this morning and the soil was parched and everything was drooping, which was surprising as it rained on Monday and even some yesterday. But whatever. Onto the flower show.

Just found this tucked away in my email archive

2011-03-31T18:36:00.002-04:00

This is a response to an email I received from a USC student who was interested in applying to study abroad at Kent in 2006. I just stumbled across it and figured I'd share. Enjoy.

----

Dear kristen,
I am an anthropology major here at USC. I am thinking about studying at the University of Kent for my study abroad. I found your name listed on the study abroad office’s virtual advising network. I was hoping to ask you some questions about your time in England.
Did you enjoy studying in Canterbury? What was the university like? Was it easy for you to find your way around campus? What were the classes like? Was it expensive to study at the University of Kent? Did you live in a dorm? How did you find the people there? Were they friendly? What did you like to do on and off campus? How was the weather in Canterbury? Would you ever like to go back there again one day?
I would really like to know what you thought about the University of Kent and England. It will help me to make up my mind. Thank you so much for your time.
A----

show details 6/30/06

Hey A----,

You may want to take a deep breath and make a sandwich before you start reading--i tend to be a bit verbose in my praises of Kent. My year there was hands-down the best year of my life thus far, and I'd recommend it to anyone with enough guts to get on the plane. That said, i'm also aware that studying abroad is not for everyone, and some people have a seriously lousy, homesick, put-upon, offended time in the UK. It really depends on how you approach it.

Let me first cover my ass by stating clearly and directly that people are going to dislike you for being American. I've had many friends study abroad and come home screaming and yelling that they didn't make a single friend abroad because the moment they opened their mouth they alienated people with their accent. Nobody, in any country, likes Americans these days, so travel with that in mind. (Its not just the Bush administration's fault, though they've certainly helped. Americans have a penchant for being loud, bossy, impatient, rude, and ignorant in foreign countries, and if you pair that with our reputation for having money and power you'll breed a resentment streak a continent wide.) The easiest way to avoid the evil eye from your classmates is to say "i didn't vote for Bush." (even if you did--if you want to make any friends, do not associate yourself with the Republican party, support for the Iraqi war, or Christianity).

On with the answers to your questions:

I Loved Canterbury. The town is adorable--its an ancient walled, moated city with cobbled streets and more historic buildings than you can shake a stick at. Your Kent student ID card will get you into the cathedral for free at any time, and its always worth a wander. (Tourists have to pay anywhere from 8-13 pounds for admission and tours except during services) Its also crisscrossed with parks and paths that are so pretty you can't avoid picnicking in them. The town is always packed with tourists and shoppers, particularly around Christmas. C-town's proximity to Dover allows it to be a very inexpensive field trip destination for French and German school groups, so you'll do well to avoid large groups of children with giant backpacks. (There are hourly ferries from the Port of Dover to Calais, France, and foot passage costs 7 to 11 pounds. Always good for a booze cruise--beer and wine are much cheaper in France! And its only a 20-minute train ride there from central Canterbury.)

Canterbury has more bars and restaurants within its city limits than there are days in the year. Most of them are far out of the average uni student's budget, but there are a few that are worth your while. I recommend the Old Buttermarket (in the square across from the entrance to the cathedral) and the Cherry Tree (on a side road off the high street--its just a little ways down from Methven's bookstore on the right. the canterbury whole foods store is visible at the end.) Cherry tree has happy hour every day from 5-8--most pints are 2 quid! (best deal you'll find off campus.) It is also a haven for overpriced designer shops and boutiques (hence the Christmas shoppers) so if you want to shop, be sure to save up for a couple of years.

Erm...where was i. Canterbury's night life is so small its laughable. All bars close at 11pm, and the city's 4 private clubs stay open until 2am but have a cover. What most uni kids do is drink at the bars until closing, then stumble home and keep it going there until the neighbors call the police. So if you like the club scene you're going to be disappointed.

All university buildings are hideous at Kent. I think its actually a requirement written into the school's charter. The ugliest buildings by far are Eliot and Rutherford colleges (they're mirror images of each other), though Darwin runs a close second, and wins the "most contorted and difficult to navigate" award. The campus is layed out very simply and in a linear fashion, but the academic buildings resemble Escher drawings when it comes to getting around them. Eliot and Rutherford in particular are famous for having floors halfway between other floors, stairways that lead to nowhere, hallways interrupted by courtyards, and no semblance of a coherent room numbering system. The only times i've gone into Keynes college were to go to the bar on the main floor so i haven't really looked around the rest of it.

The university is by itself at the top of a big hill--it is a good mile's walk to town, so there's no non-university buildings around. The view from the library is stunning! The campus is very self-contained--you actually don't have to go to town ever if you don't want to (though where's the fun in that?). The school has 2 restaurants, 9 bars, a nightclub, 2 small grocery stores, a theater (for touring shows and movies), playing fields, and religious centers for students (the catholic student center has its own bar). Sports are not a big deal--most are just intramurals and never compete outside of town. The biggest student gatherings are at the Venue (the nightclub) on weekends and Pound-A-Pint night at Woody's bar in Parkwood.

Concerning housing...this is where it gets confusing. Kent offers two styles of housing: catered and self-catered. (i.e. we feed you or you feed you.) Catered housing is dorm-style in one of the four colleges, or self-contained school units. Darwin, Rutherford, Eliot, and Keynes colleges are massive, ugly buildings that contain classrooms, bedrooms, department offices, restaurants, ballrooms, bars, courtyards, theaters, lecture halls, lounges, shops, and game rooms. I've actually known students to not leave their college for weeks on end. Anyway, in these situations, you generally live on a hall in a small bedroom by yourself and share a potty and a shower with 5-6 other people. You have a sink in your bedroom. The residence hallways have doors at each end to block out some of the noise from the rest of the building--not that it matters 'cos they're party central 24/7. Residence in the colleges includes breakfast and lunch every day in the central ballroom, though breakfast is very early in the morning and the food is...urgh. can we say rubbery eggs?

The other housing option is self-catered, which is what I did. Self-catered accommodation is in a large community of townhouses about a half mile from the center of campus. (its a pleasant 10 minute walk down a very nice, well-lit path. the only time it sucks is when the paths get icy.) The area is called Parkwood, and the townhouses have 5 or 6 bedrooms and are arranged into courts of anywhere from 10 to 20 houses. Everyone gets their own bedroom (the idea of shared accommodation is rather foreign to the English) and the 5 bedroom houses have a full kitchen, powder room downstairs, and potty, shower, and sink upstairs. The six bedroom houses have a really big kitchen and dining room, potty and shower downstairs and up, and sinks in each bedroom. (I lived in a 5 br--it was a bit tight but nice.) the residents are responsible for keeping their bedrooms clean, though housekeeping comes through weekly to mop the common areas, clean toilets, and replace tp. The stoves are gas, which rocks, but the ovens are gas too, which sucks. just so you know.

There's a third option available now, which is a couple of big multi-storey buildings just on the edge of Parkwood which have suites, but i really don't know anything about them because they were being built while i was there. More info can be found at www.kent.ac.uk/hospitality.

Near the center of Parkwood is a complex which houses a grocery store, a laundromat, a housing desk (staffed with nice people who'll sell you laundry tokens when the dispenser breaks) and Woody's bar--the best (and cheapest) bar on campus.

Keep in mind that at Kent, as with most British schools, university accommodation is offered to freshers (first years) and erasmus students only. Second years and beyond live in houses all over town, though many are in a large community of townhouses about a mile off campus.

You are likely to find that all of your neighbors are really, really immature--even compared to American freshmen. There are reasons for this, most notably the fact that many Kent students have spent their entire youth education in same-sex schools. While this is not necessarily the case outside of the Southeast, be aware that Kent is a snotty rich kid uni and many of them went to very expensive grammar schools. Hence a lot of people will act like they've never seen someone of the opposite sex before and get really stupid. Disease transfer is rampant throughout the first semester. Be Careful.

Classes. Ah, class. The least significant part of my study abroad experience.

Each department behaves differently, and as I majored in theatre i doubt what I have to say will bear any relation to your experience. But across the board there are certain tendencies--a full courseload is 120 hours over three trimesters. Most classes will be worth either 15 or 30 hours, though i've heard that varies when you get into the sciences. The first two trimesters are spent in class, and the third is for exams. The theatre department did not offer any classes below 30 hours, so it meant that i had 2 classes (modules) each term. yeah. 2. But i had at least 4 class meetings (classes) a week as each module had both a lecture and a seminar. The seminars were the best part, hands-down, as you really get to discuss the course material with your teacher and a small group of classmates and debate or even bicker about how you feel about it. ALWAYS BE PREPARED FOR YOUR SEMINARS.

My grades in the lecture/seminar classes came from one or two short papers (2500 words), one dissertation (5,000 words), one presentation (at least half an hour including questions and discussion--you basically teach a class on your subject matter and lead the seminar), and participation/attendance. Note i did not include exams in that. The theatre department did not have exams. I actually had 6 entire weeks free to fiddle around and have a good time. This is, unfortunately, not the case for other departments.

My classes second semester were weirder--whereas first semester each lecture was one hour and each seminar two hours, second semester i had one class that met two hours on monday without the professor to prepare a performance and seminar for tuesday. The tuesday class was 5 hours long and included presentation, lecture, seminar, performance, discussion thereof, and often a film of the next week's play. (it was Modern European Theatre 2: Beyond Naturalism. DO NOT TAKE THIS COURSE.) The other class that term was a 4-hour acting class, but it was fun.

The classes have less, but harder work than American classes. you are on your own for a lot of it--not only acquiring texts from the library and reading them, but for finding research materials and preparing your presentations. Nothing is spoon-fed to you, and grading is tough. Moreover, every paper and exam is graded twice--both by your professor and an external grading board, which checks for plagiarism and cheating. Nobody earns a grade above an 80--they don't believe in perfection, or anything near it. But a 70 is an excellent grade.

A professor can make or break a class--i had two excellent professors, one sucky professor, and one bitch who artificially lowered my grade because she didn't like Americans. There's no excusing that. The sucky professor knew his stuff but he wasn't nice and tore everyone apart for their commentary, even when the student was right. Oh well. I learned a lot, i did a lot of research and a Whole lotta writing, but i didn't really care about the classroom. I made b's (known in the UK as a 2.1 or a 2.2--might i suggest you google the UK grading system? its a nightmare.) but they transferred back to USC as "pass" and did not affect my gpa.

The easiest and best way to meet people is to go to the campus bars. England is a drinking culture, so if you don't drink for whatever reason, people are going to think you're weird. They drink, but second years and up drink responsibly--it looks bad to get plastered too. Alcohol is not put on a pedestal in the UK--its consumption is permitted and encouraged among college students--so people are less inclined to abuse it the way we do here. My favorite drink at Woodys was the Snakebite--it is half cheap lager, half cheap cider, with a shot of blackcurrant syrup thrown in. Very pink, but yummy (though a lot of people hate it. just try it once!)
Without alcohol, most people are not particularly willing to talk to strangers. It is up to you to strike up the conversation, though once you do, chances are they'll be more than ready to talk to you for days. I made a lot of friends just by being genial and southern--it surprised a lot of my friends to see the number of folks who would wave and say hi to me every time i walked to class. Don't act like you're afraid of the locals--they can smell fear. Just be chill--don't apologise for being American, but don't gloat about it either. The last thing anyone wants to hear is "well its better in 'Merica 'cos..." If they see that you're willing to accept their culture for what it is, they'll be more likely to accept you.

Native Kentish folk tend to be more friendly and open than Londoners, who are trained from early childhood to expect anyone who strikes up a conversation with them to be a mugger or sex offender. Bar talk again is easiest.

I actually saved money when i went to Kent--the housing is cheaper! USC has an arrangement with UKC in which you pay tuition to USC (if you're in-state it means you can keep your life scholarship) and housing to Kent, and their exchangers do the same. When i was there the pound was worth $1.93- 2.00, so the cost of living was massive, but i budgeted carefully and came back broke, but not in debt. (I earned about $6,000 the summer before so i had that, LIFE, and my stafford loan to support me.) A few tips for not going broke:

don't buy textbooks if possible--check them out of the library
don't take the bus into town--its a very nice walk
shop at Tesco instead of Marks and Spencer (groceries)
pick a day or two for drinking each week
take out cash once a week and try not to use your debit
if you shop for clothes or other stuff, shop outside of Canterbury.
buy electronics in america!

Oh, random side note--there is a path that leads from Parkwood all the way to Whitstable (six miles--whitstable is on the water) its a BEAUTIFUL walk and was one of my favorite things to do on slow days with friends.
Canterbury is a 1-hour train ride from London (2 hour by coach (bus) but half the price). I dated a guy who's family lived in London, and got to spend three weeks with them over spring break (christmas and spring breaks are both a month). It really is a cool city to visit, though not really a great place to live. too crowded for my tastes.

Weather. umm. If you get seasonal depression, might i suggest the south of France? England is routinely gray. You get the odd pretty day in spring and summer, but don't expect anything besides gray, dismal, rainy weather. On the plus side, though, it doesn't get insanely hot or cold, and we got a foot of snow three times, to everyone's enjoyment!

Would i go back? I've been trying to get back there for a year now, but scheduling and finances are rather prohibitive. I dream of Canterbury still--i didn't want to come home. I still don't want to be home. One year there and i'm trying to become a citizen. The biggest draw is the people--they're typically very liberal, very chill, and very secular. I like that in a culture, though USC students have gone over there and wanted nothing more to come home for those exact three reasons. They have no patience for prejudice against anybody (in response to American congressional debate over homosexual marriage, Ireland went and formally legalized it) and they can respect diversity among people and cultures without cramming it down your throat, and their government is forced by the people to use funding responsibly and reasonably.

I helped a girl get over to Kent for this past semester--she hated everything about it. She didn't make any friends because she refused to go to bars, studied too much, and convinced herself it was her calling in life to witness the Bible to the crazy heathens of the UK. Most people rejected her solidly, and told her why. After three months of this policy her dad finally told her to loosen up and try doing as the romans do. Not only did she start to have fun, but people started to want to be around her. By the time it was time to come home, she didn't want to either.

Okay, sorry, i know this is long. take it in stages. There's a lot of worthwhile information cloaked in opinion--i can't write any other way.

Hope this has been useful! Let me know if/when you have any other questions or would like to see photographs. I have about 1,000 of canterbury, my social life, london, Paris, Barcelona, and campus.

Regards,
Kristen

No. NO. You are an adult.

2011-03-30T08:38:00.004-04:00

Here I am. 26 years old. Highly educated, proven capable of handling a wealth of tasks with ease, courtesy, and warmth. Able to hang upside-down off the side of an aircraft carrier with a drill in hand Monday, then collate investment documents and tax mailings with precise attention to accuracy Tuesday, and with great decorum put clothes on hungry women Wednesday. I am bright, capable, versatile, and ready for a committed, rewarding career.

So WHY am I seriously considering applying for weekend gigs on the South Bank for a pittance?

No. I am a grown-up with real debts and real responsibilities. I should not think that my place is in a company-logo tee shirt surrounded by tourists on the sidewalk. That's one small step above standing on the corner waving a cardboard arrow toward the nearest McDonald's--a gig a homeless guy I know in Baltimore takes occasionally in exchange for burgers. I have worked too hard on my education to think that I don't deserve self-respect and a living wage.

But what education do I actually have? As far as business-sector skills are concerned, I have very, very few--and only ones that I've gained on the job. Touch-typing, filing, mail distribution, correspondence, dictation, teaching CEOs to use their computers...all tasks I've only undertaken as a low-paid temp. Nobody wants to pay people enough to not only eat but pay for their rent AND their student loans to hang lights and build fake walls. There's too many highly-qualified technicians out there who are happy to do it for free because someone told them that after a few years of interning and volunteering, the money'll start coming in.

This is not actually true. There are always enough recent graduates and hopeful young people to exploit that the need to pay people doesn't actually come up. If they start demanding money, you just find someone new. Now that I have a MA in being exploited I've moved up from being a dime a dozen to a dime for five, but still. A two-year turnaround on burnouts is plenty of time to keep your theatre staffed and your coffers full.

----

Oh I'm sorry I missed that lunch date, Arthur, but with a degree in maths and another in astrophysics, it was either hitch a ride on a spaceship or head back to the dole queue on Monday.

Henrietta

2011-03-22T13:27:00.005-04:00

I just finished reading The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot. It was an excellent read and beautifully edited. (Before this I read in rapid succession all but two of Jasper Fforde's comedic novels, such as The Eyre Affair and The Fourth Bear, all of which contain at least one glaring typo for every five pages, so I felt this was noteworthy.) While heart-wrenching and painful to read (particularly when Skloot and Henrietta's daughter Deborah find Elsie's mildewing autopsy report) occasionally disgusting (watching Zakariyya eat over a pint of ice cream off a paper plate), and reminiscent of all of the time I spent in high school learning to hate myself for just how much white people have abused black people for centuries in the USA, I nevertheless had room in my brain left over to consider the more pragmatic issues surrounding Mrs. Lacks's cancerous tissue.

The big question that dominates the end of the book regards the ownership of components of the self once they have been voluntarily removed from the body. No one argues that if someone hacks off someone else's arm for the fun of it, they should put it back, or at the very least compensate their victim for the harm they've caused. But if a surgeon removes a damaged or damaging component of a willing patient, should the patient still have some claim to it? I'm referring to tumours, gangrenous appendages, iffy-looking moles, ruptured appendices--all things that A. people are better off without, and B. won't survive on their own once they're cut off.

If biopsies, blood samples, and other bits and pieces are useless to patients, and will more than likely rot or be discarded if given back after testing, then it makes sense that people who not only have a use for the samples, but know how to keep them useful should keep them. Figuring they're doing all the work to keep the cells alive, preserved, or indexed, and spending all the money on formaldehyde and electricity to run deep freezers, it's only fair that, given the opportunity, they should be allowed to earn the money back from any commercially viable discoveries they make using said samples.

But.

Patients did put in all the effort of growing those tumours from the outset. Whether or not the friendly doctor saved his life by removing it, and whether or not he wanted said tumour, the patient did do all of the primary work. Not only that, why shouldn't the patient be compensated for all the time he spent in pain, nauseated, bedridden, coughing up blood, and generally having a lousy time of it? We have this concept in our world that people should pay to get better, not be paid for being sick. But being sick is work--indeed, for some people it's the most difficult work they've ever undertaken. It may not always be work that supports a profitable enterprise, but if a patient is undergoing some course of treatment it has the potential to. The fact that some people volunteer to make theatre doesn't mean that practitioners shouldn't be paid if the show makes a profit. Surely if a researcher wishes to be paid for his medicine, he should compensate everyone who worked to achieve it.

Now, Henrietta may have waived her eligibility for compensation--not because of something she signed in life, but because her cancer cells went out of their way to sabotage years and billions of dollars' worth of research all around the world. I mean, I'm sure there's a breach of contract violation in that somewhere. If nothing else, it made a lot of people unhappy when they thought they'd made breakthroughs, only to realize that no, they'd just made another freezer-ful of Baltimore Black Lady. Maybe that's what happens when you harvest malignancies without informed consent. Henrietta let science make great advances and save millions of lives, but she got some pretty good jabs in for her trouble.

Anyway, a very well-written, touching, and pragmatic book that approaches the reader like you're an interested adult--at no point did I feel patronized, but the style likewise never dropped into unintelligible medical jargon. I'm very glad Skloot took the time to do it properly (the project took her ten years), and to communicate with Henrietta's family as people--to not only get their story, but to help them understand what happened to their mother, and how she changed the world. I'm grateful to Henrietta Lacks.

And Georgios Papanikolaou.

Poked, Prodded, and Tea'd

2011-03-21T10:45:00.003-04:00

So, I just got back from the colposcopy clinic. A very nice (man) gynaecologist did exactly what the procedure says on the tin, with a bonus prize: the colposcope has a camera built in, which was hooked up to a monitor, so I got to watch. The nurse (woman) kept me distracted and talking and I didn't really feel any discomfort, but I was absolutely fascinated by the whole thing. My cervix is exactly the same colour as my gums! There was a little spot, about the size of a pencil eraser, that turned white and looked odd, but the doctor didn't think it was a big deal. He took a cylindrical biopsy of it with this long skinny contraption, and got me to cough when he did it and somehow I didn't feel a thing. (I also didn't watch the monitor for that bit.) Well done there, I think.

Meanwhile the nurse was asking me about where I came from, oh isn't it warm there? You said you came here as a student, what did you study?

"I...erm.. What Did I study?" I was entirely too fascinated by my own personalized NOVA show to remember anything about myself. "My mom's a nurse too, but she works labour and delivery. This is so odd--I'm having a hard time believing it's me I can see." "Do you want to have kids?" "No, that's not really the plan." "Well, if you decide to have babies, they'll grow just behind that." "I'm well aware of that, I just mean I feel rather detached, more like I'm watching a science programme. Is that the string from my IUD?"

Afterwards I asked to see the biopsy, and found it fascinating, which made the nurse laugh like a drain. And there was a condom on the handle of the colposcope. And instead of foot stirrups they had these sort of curved leg pad things, far more comfortable. And everything smelled of vinegar. (The naughty cells react to vinegar, so fair enough). The lighting in the hospital is terrible, but the place was clean and well-appointed.

No one but me in the waiting room spoke English, but there was another waiting room just around the corner full of pregnant teenagers and their boyfriends, all of them white and dumb-looking. I wandered in there on accident and was briefly confused because they all had numbers, but the receptionist hadn't given me one. I was also the only person in there who had come alone, which got me some pitying looks until I realised I was in the room with pictures of babies all over the walls when I should have been in the room plastered with posters for cancer support groups. Way to make a lady feel comfortable.

So now I get to wait three weeks for the biopsy to...do its thing, I suppose. Are they going to try and grow it? Or make a slide of it and examine the cell pattern? I suppose I could look it up. I'll go do that.

Inexperienced and Unskilled, but suck at digging ditches

2011-03-18T14:54:00.007-04:00

Hello world. I need a job. I've been working for about ten years in a diverse array of fields, off and on around my education, all around the US and now London. Well, I say working in London. I say working.

Okay, scratch that.

See, I've had the fun experience of either never being asked to do anything--quite literally, sit in front of this desk and wait for the phone to ring though it probably won't--and doing highly-skilled and important tasks that I'm not actually supposed to be doing for busy bosses who have eventually decided I was competent.

I have a large résumé, but it's full of short contracts, internships, temp work, and good jobs that I nevertheless did without a license or proof that I knew what I was doing. I'm a good MIG welder (untested) a strong rigger (unqualified, and with lapsed belay certification from 2004) a skilled carpenter (scenic, unverifiable), and a capable lighting electrician who can work safely at heights (unconfirmed). I've competently operated cherry pickers (without a license) and can drive a car (in the USA). I've maintained and repaired vehicles (with my dad) and can fix and upholster furniture (though the last place I did this as a job I left after a screaming match with my misogynistic boss who tried to make me cut Styrofoam with a hot knife without proper ventilation or a clean respirator while mocking my Wiccan co-worker for being a heathen and 'playing around with voodoo').

I have about 6 months (over three years) of administrative experience. I have a master's degree (in theatre) and a valid work visa (for 2 years, the point of which is to help me find a job that will sponsor me indefinitely, which is a burden no employer wants to deal with). I've never been fired (but I've had dozens of contracts lasting four hours to three months) and have spent the past six months volunteering (as a lighting technician in dodgy-at-best theatres and found spaces). I'm organized and efficient (when I have to be) have a pleasant telephone manner (with an American accent, which is inappropriate for a truly British company) and can type 95 words per minute (when it's warm out, otherwise my fingers lock up and I can manage about half a sentence before I start spewing gobbledegook.)

All told, with my CV and personality...I wouldn't hire me. Maybe I can go into landscaping. I quite like plants. Check out my lavatera seedlings:

And my tulips, as they get going:

And my daffodil (yes, just the one)

and my whatever the heck this is:

Green thumb? Perhaps not. More like greenish toe, but not in a gangrene sort of way.

Oh the life of the dabbler, the short-term gigger. The Temp. Too competent to be an amateur, but too inexperienced to be a professional.

col-PAHS-co-py

2011-03-10T06:19:00.002-05:00

So. A letter just came through the door inviting me down to the girls room for a poke-n-prod.

Erm. To rephrase. I've received correspondence from my local NHS trust informing me that I have an appointment for a colposcopy. Apparently my most recent Pap smear turned up a HSIL, or High Grade Squamous Intraepithelial Lesion, or Severe Cervical Intraepithelial Neoplasia, which I've had a fun hour or so of reading about. At my appointment in 2 weeks I'll get the fun experience of having a 3% acetic acid solution spread on my cervix to see if it turns white in areas where there's a high concentration of cellular nuclei. I'll probably be biopsied and may even get to experience the sublime joy of the LEEP (looped electric excision procedure, which sounds a lot like the slice-n-toast knife in The Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy film) And then, joy of joys, I'll get two more Paps over the next year, and annual pappage over the next 10. Whee, who doesn't love the sound of that?

Interestingly, in my last hour of low-grade-panic-driven research, I've learned that the plastic broom I've always associated with Pap tests is not very good at collecting cells, which might help to explain why my 2009 Pap came up completely normal but all of a sudden in 2011 it's come up hellafuckedup (technical term).

I've also learned that the person who detected my abnormality is called a Cytoscreener, which is awesome. Thanks, Cytoscreener, for helping me stay healthy.

I've known for a while that most everyone has at least one, and probably several strains of HPV. I know I have had at least 2, now--I also got a verruca from lifeguarding at a summer camp in 2004. Kids are gross. I had to have the verruca frozen off with liquid nitrogen which was astonishingly painful. Like, it felt kinda funny for a sec while the doctor was applying the goop, then he got up and left the room just as a bolt of lightning shot from my heel to my hip, causing me to clench up and jerk around like a rabbit in a snare while emergency lights flashed red in my head alerting me to the fact that my foot had been cut off. If the same thing has to happen to my cervix, be prepared for a killing spree. Getting an IUD was bad enough.

I like the way the letter was phrased. To paraphrase: "you're probably fine, this is all fine, don't worry, you're great, we love you, cancer, you're a good person, you're better than healthy, it's probably nothing, do not miss your appointment for any reason, this happens all the time, it's downright routine, hugs and kisses, NHS." Kinda like that time I was grabbed by a London transit police officer to have my Oyster card checked after a fault caused me to get smushed in the gate--ID badge, big smile, mind if I check your card? big smile. I'm sure it's fine, you look like a good person who wouldn't try and get away with not paying, criminal, big smile, there we go--the person ahead of you must have not touched the reader properly, big smile.

Oof. What is it, when people tell you not to worry, it just makes you even more anxious? Like when people tell you it's not going to hurt, you totally know it's going to be a gore-splosion, or when someone in a bad movie says "nothing could possibly go wrong." I'm sure I'm fine, I'll be fine, and even if it has the potential to be not fine, it is still in a it's-fine stage of not fine. But nevertheless...AAAARRGGGHHH.

As for silver-lining thinking: At least I'm not in the USA without health insurance right now. I have a valid NHS number and a valid work visa.

As for appropriate responses to that line of thinking: FUCK YOU, REPUBLICANS. I'm safer in the UK than at home, despite massive blows to the NHS under a Tory-led initiative to try and privatise and profit-drive healthcare because they're mass-murdering wankfucktards who have no concept of I can't afford it EVEN IF MY LIFE DEPENDS ON IT and therefore assume that poor people just don't care enough...even with those EVIL IDIOTS in charge, I'm BETTER OFF than with YOU.

Without tax-funded women's health centres like Planned Parenthood, many women will not receive Pap smears. They won't be able to afford them, or at least won't see an appreciable cost/benefit ratio to paying to have them as often as they should. They will not detect problems early. They will not have the fucking chance that I think I have...fuck. Fuck fuck fuck. Fucking republicrats. Fucking religious aristocracy trying to punish all us naughty heathens for our normal, human behaviour. Fuck you, yes you--judging me for bringing all this on myself with my youthful indiscriminate actions. If you hadn't told me not to, I probably wouldn't have. I pay my fucking taxes... (descends into incomprehensible mewling)

And Guess what I started reading on Monday?

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, by Rebecca Skloot.

Faaaaaaaack.

March in London, or "What are Begonias supposed to look like?"

2011-03-05T11:29:00.005-05:00

My poor, sad, confused house-plant. I have no idea really how to care for it, or if I'm even supposed to at this time of year. I just looked at a bunch of pictures on the interwebs of what begonias are supposed to look like, and...mine doesn't look like that. It has one sad and strange looking cluster of flowers dangling off to one side and is otherwise a green, sprawling mess. Most of the leaves look happy and it has new growth but it's not the compact, flower-laden plant you see in the pictures.

I just took a lot of pictures of it with flash so that may confuse it, I don't know. I can just see all its chloroplasts screaming "I'm blind! Oh the Humanity!" (begoniaty?)

I water it when the soil gets dry, it is well-drained and gets as much sunlight as it can (not much, it's London and it's March) and I've fertilized it once or twice. I just have no idea if it looks the way it is supposed to, if it is happy and thriving or on its last legs. Should I put it outside when it gets warmer? Should I prune it? I put it in a larger pot about four months ago and it got bigger, but maybe I shouldn't have done that. But it has flowers at all now, whereas when we first got here it had none, and continued having none until I repotted it. I worry inordinately about this plant.

I think I have a sort of ET relationship with my lone house-plant. When I'm all seasonal-affective so is it, or perhaps I just imagine it to be so. I'm not getting enough sun, so Windowplant is likewise in the dark. I tried growing cilantro on the windowsill and it sprouted, looked around for about five minutes, and died. Well screw you too, dumb herb. I'm nervous to start any seedlings for the summer 'cos I'm pretty sure they'll bail on me too. I'm not going to bother with aubergines this year, but I'm eager to try courgettes with the assistance of fungicide. That stuff makes a mountainous heap of difference (between having courgettes and...not)

London has this cute tendency to cloud over for the brightest part of the day. Like today. It was cloudy all morning until about noon, when it cleared up partway, got me all excited...then clouded over again until just now. It is currently too dim to enjoy the clear sky, and Windowplant is not getting anything out of it. I pruned some dead twigs off my Big Pink Plant in the cold cloudy gloom, but it doesn't look like it wants to bloom this year. It has buds, but they look to be leaves. FAIL.

Quotation mark "abuse"

2011-03-03T07:03:00.002-05:00

What is with the anti-freedom camp these days that makes them feel it is appropriate to put quotation marks around every word they find objectionable? "Gay" is the new homosexual. "Rights" is the new...rights? These numbnuts are so intent on claiming that other legal Americans don't deserve equal protection under the law that they will suggest that the word right may be used ironically. That's not funny. It's weird. I've actually seen the sentence ""gays" believe they "deserve" the "right" to same-sex "marriage"" on an official statement, along with "it is not "bullying" for my child to encourage your "gay" child to seek the path of righteousness."

I think your "grammar" is "gross".

It is also amusing that they've named their movement "pro-family" which is another can of douche. How can someone who is pro-family impede others in their attempts to have...a family? I'm pretty sure the "gays" are the "pro-family" side of this debate, and you, friends, are in the "anti-equality" trench. Or how about "pro-theocracy" if you've gotta be pro-something? Too much of a mouthful? Pro-hate? Pro-bigotry? Pro-white-wealthy-fundie-closeted-men-and-subjugated-sexually-repressed-women?

This is just another "grievous abuse of language" to go along with their gun-waving pro-life, union-busting pro-democracy, and consenting to job, service, and benefit losses while paying more in taxes so the aristocracy can maintain their tax cuts pro-liberty catch phrases. Think, please, before you give yourself a misnomer.

Hello UK

2011-02-28T10:48:00.003-05:00

Hello, my name is Kristen, and I have the right to be here.

My newly-vignetted passport arrived registered mail this morning. I'm legal, it's official, it's in my hands.

I scheduled a National Insurance Number interview last week after I spoke with my UKBA case worker. I called to confirm he'd received my bank statements, and instead of answering that, he told me my visa was granted. (Oh darn! But I swear I wasn't hounding him to find out anything besides the delivery status of my documents!) I feel a bit silly now, as the Job Centre worker asked if I'd like a meeting tomorrow (Tuesday) and I declined as I'd been told my visa probably wouldn't be in my hands until Wednesday. She bumped it up to Friday. So now I have another week of thumb-twiddling, but things are in play.

My new visa is valid until the end of February 2013. I have two years to find a full-time job that would be happy to help me stay. I've already been looking will now continue my search with less despair. And I can apply without hoping they won't call me back immediately--I can hope for Fast Turnaround! Ooooooh.

----

In other news (if you don't care to hear a diatribe about religion, politics, or authoritarian regimes, the blog post is finished, nothing else to see here.) I read a lot of Science Blogs, particularly Professor PZ Myers' Pharyngula. He teaches biology in Minnesota and points out when religiosos try to cause harm or damage politics in their own special ways. Yesterday he provided a link to the blog of a Catholic wacko who annoyed me by trying to establish through scripture that giving a woman an orgasm is a mortal sin. So I've been giving him a hard time. I figure he won't publish my response to his blog post so I've reposted it here. If you think frank anatomical discussion is explicit, I suppose it is explicit. As a courtesy, I elected to try and write this as though I am party to the writer's own skewed version of reality. I probably got a few things wrong as I am neither Catholic nor tolerant of religion, but I did try.

----

Your refusal to address women and concerned husbands' questions regarding mutual enjoyment of sex demonstrates weakness--not of your mind, but of your evidence. You know that the location of clitoris, if designed by God, doesn't make a whole lot of sense, and that unpleasant and un-fulfilling sex is divisive, not unitive, and leads slowly and painfully to the breakdown of marriage. It doesn't matter if you don't believe the purpose of sex is pleasure--if one party enjoys it and the other doesn't, it fails the 3-font challenge of your description.

But I’ve figured out something that can help you. It’s simple, really, so I’ll state it simply. The clitoris is not sexual, so touching it is not evil.

Check it out. Yes, biologically the glans of the penis and the clitoris are derived from the same nerve cluster during gestation, so technically they are the same thing. But functionally, and therefore doctrinally, they are utterly different. The clitoris contributes nothing toward procreation. The organ itself and its functionality are in no way related to baby-making, therefore usage of the clitoris is unrelated to sex. The fact that stimulating it leads to an energy build-up and release that society calls “orgasm” is irrelevant. The fact that it is near the vaginal opening is irrelevant–unless you want to argue that the bridge of the nose contributes to the function of the eye. The concern of the Church is that procreative organs are exploited for pleasure and not for procreation, but the clitoris is in no way procreative, therefore exploitation of it is wholly outside the realm of sexual ethics. Touching the clitoris cannot lead to the spilling of semen nor the expulsion of the egg. As long as you do not massage it with a procreative organ its use is cleanly and definitively separate from sex.

If you try to impress upon me the notion that the clitoris is sexual, then you are seeking to impress upon me the notion that the clitoris is a vital component of procreation. If so, then you’ve unfortunately defeated your own argument–if it is vital, then it must be stimulated in order for God’s design for marital acts to be fulfilled. If it is not, it is a system and entity entirely unto itself and is therefore fine. It exists not for sexual pleasure, but simply pleasure itself.

If you had to reach into the woman’s sexual organ to stimulate the clitoris it would be different, but then again, this issue probably never would have come up as stimulation thereof would be considered a normal component of the procreative act. But it is separate, therefore it is separate.

If you can find, in scripture, anywhere that it says “women have an organ separate from the entrance to the womb that feels good when you touch it–do not touch it” fair enough. But anything more vague than that does not pass muster. It is a separate entity, it is not sexual, so it may be stimulated by either partner with impunity.

developmental biology for beginners, or Mother Nature is Amoral

2011-02-26T10:39:00.007-05:00

If by some bizarre set of circumstances Asshat McGee in Georgia manages to shove through his "miscarriage punishable by death" legislation, the logical next step is actually the prohibition of any non-barrier form of contraception up to and including the rhythm method.

See, he wants to define personhood as beginning the moment a sperm bites into an egg. Wham, two cells combine, it's Joe. Unfortunately, the fact that cells have combined in no way guarantees a live birth, or even that the active zygote won't be passed in the woman's next menstruation. Indeed, it is a matter of general consensus among reproductive healthcare providers that after day 13 of the menstrual cycle one or more eggs is released into the uterus and will survive about 24 hours. If the egg is not fertilized in this time it is flushed out of the body about two weeks later. If the egg is fertilized in this time but for whatever reason doesn't adhere to the blood-rich uterine lining it too is flushed out of the body about two weeks later. Joe, meet tampon.

Women's bodies do this on their own all the time, as is doubtless being discussed throughout the internet at this moment. Billions of uteri over the years have rejected or simply failed to accept viable zygotes because the zygote simply never made it over there, for no particular reason. This is not a tragedy, this is not a miscarriage, this is not a baby, this is not a person. It is a microscopic cluster of cells that oozed out of a woman along with a whole bunch of blood and mucus.

Inter-uterine devices (IUDs (or Coils, in the UK)) work (we think) by inhibiting a zygote's ability to attach to the lining of the uterus. If you look at it like a Fundie, that would mean that an IUD works by starving the poor helplessly-flailing fertilized cell to death. Progesterone-infused IUDS are even worse--they don't usually inhibit egg release, but they do prevent the body from building up a uterine lining And physically inhibit zygote implantation. Oh, what a hostile environment!

Hormonal birth control methods generally do inhibit ovum release, so I guess they should be Fundie-fine, but they're absolutely horrible in every other way. They screw around with women's physiology so much that they cause neurological disorders, emotional disturbances, weight problems, digestive problems, dermatological problems, fibroid problems, bleeding disorders, and a host of other unpleasant changes. Barrier methods likewise prevent fertilization...when they work, but they're notoriously movable, breakable, by-passable, and faulty. The most reliable, least-unpleasant form of contraception is in fact the IUD, which, to the Fundie, could be considered forced miscarriage, i.e. muuuuurrrrder.

Obviously, non-implantation happens on its own constantly--the Mayo clinic has stated that non-implantation and even implanted miscarriage within the first 3 weeks of pregnancy occurs all the damn time, far more than the 1/4 of detected pregnancies that end in spontaneous miscarriage. Evidence exists to suggest the likelihood of Most pregnancies failing at this time, but it is utterly impossible to tell how many unacknowledged fertilized ova have been absorbed by sanitary products, even in women who were hoping to not have a period this month.

All IUDs do is bump up this number a bit, but if you believe, as many morons do, that personhood begins at fertilization, they could be seen as aiding and abetting the natural inhospitable nature of the uterus toward God's chosen innocent helpless blastocysts. It would follow, then, that the miscarriage police would feel comfortable in banning implantation-inhibitors, and should enforce that all sexually active women take human chorionic gonadotrophin supplements to prevent evil progesterone cycles triggering the uterine lining to shed before implantation occurs. If personhood begins at fertilization, we must do everything in our power to ensure that zygotes survive, including suppressing normal biology and causing heinous damage to women's bodies and minds in the process.

----

The trouble is, religion and law don't really fit with the truth of how bodies and societies actually work. They exist in this idealized, inhuman sphere that cannot cope with the truth that the body is amoral. It does its own thing no matter what you tell it. Whenever life begins is irrelevant to the uterus. The menstrual cycle is only a pattern of chemical releases, one that pregnancy may or may not interrupt. So too is a woman's decision-making process entirely comprised of electrochemical impulses. Whether the uterus or the brain decides to not see a pregnancy through, it is all part of the functionality of the female. If a fertilization results in a non-viable foetus, if a woman is on drugs, what have you--the inside of a woman must be off-limits to the prying, judging, moralizing, arbitrary eyes of the law and the church.

In conclusion: It may be Joe, but that really doesn't matter.

breakdown at the PO

2011-02-21T06:57:00.002-05:00

Thank you, NatWest Greenwich bank guy. The interim statement you requested on my behalf was shoved through my door on Saturday morning, three days earlier than expected. I re-enveloped it and took it to the post office to send to my case handler about an hour ago. I was fine addressing it, hiking up there, waiting in line...then I got to the window and the shit hit my mental fan.

Hands shaking, I slid the envelope to the attendant and she asked what I wanted her to do with it. I said I didn't know, I needed to get it there by...

'Tomorrow?' she helpfully supplied. 'That'd be registered mail, guaranteed by tomorrow. £5.20. You'll get a tracking number.'

Wow, that's a lot of money. It doesn't weigh anything. That seems ridiculous.

'What's first class?'

'£1.20, but it's not guaranteed overnight. It may get there in two to three days. Are the contents valuable?'

'Financially, no, but valuable. Um.'

'Are they replaceable?'

'I... I don't know. I mean technically yes, they were free, but they're worth a lot to my visa, they're worth everything. But if they don't get there by Friday they're worthless. Absolutely worthless. I could get more copies if they were damaged but it wouldn't happen in time and by then I'd be riding freight back to the port of Charleston and OH GOD JUST SEND IT REGISTERED. I'll have to pay debit because I don't have any cash because I'm broke and you know five quid really shouldn't feel like that much money but it's a lot to meeee...'

Cue breakdown into tears in the Co-Op a few minutes later. I'm sorry, Post Office worker. I don't know how much of the above I actually said.

Notes from a discussion; A letter I sent to my senator

2011-02-18T09:27:00.004-05:00

I can honestly say I've never had a worshipful attitude toward science. I recognize science for what it is--the process of trying to figure out how things work. That's it. Its not fickle--it grows and changes as researchers continue to think they've figured things out. There's no central hierarchy, it's just an ever-growing body of knowledge. Some published papers are bullshit, some may lead to helpful technologies. Conceptual science rarely sticks its nose into my daily life, though if I'm seeking medicine for a gastric ailment I will seek the advice of a qualified pharmacist.

I don't think I understand your sentiment regarding love's enslavement. I certainly don't allow my behaviour, wants, needs, or opinions to be dominated by the people I love. If we differ, we discuss. Frequently we agree to disagree and leave it alone. We may try to persuade one another to conform to our thinking, but we are free to refuse. If we come across an insurmountable, relationship-ending difference, we're free to leave. That's one of the great things about being an adult--you're not bound to places and people that make you unhappy, and you're not required to do things that make you unhappy to please others. If you choose to...well, that makes me sad, but it's your choice.

Religions are not like this, however. According to many sects and theocratic governments, if your wants and needs do not conform to established teachings, you must change. Even if they are not harmful to yourself or others, your views and behaviours are not to be tolerated. And according to their beliefs, you can't get away--if you reject your religion to pursue that which makes you happy, you'll be punished--either after death or by your state. There is no room for the self in religion. If that makes me selfish. . . good. It's not anybody else's job to give a hoot about my distinct individuality.

The thing that is so different between mortal love and holy love, though, is that if you stop believing that an omnipotent supreme being loves you--not because you've done something wrong, but because you can't believe it exists--it disappears as though it never was. This is not so for another human being. I can't decide that Ben doesn't love me. Even if I try and convince myself he doesn't, my disbelief in it won't change it. Likewise if he stops loving me but I continue to believe that he does, that won't make him start again. But as soon as I realized I didn't believe in holy love, it went away and I felt fine. No grieving, no sense of loss. Quite the opposite--for the first time, things made sense and I felt whole.

I didn't have a gaping hole in my psyche or emotional needs that I had to turn around and fill with something else--physics or what have you. The desire to worship is not inherent. That's where a lot of people get lost, and where a lot of people try to interject their own Ism-bound interpretation of simple atheism. Atheism is not a belief. It is a concise declaration that you have an absence thereof, because "sansbeliefitude" sounds funny and custom decrees that you can't get away with saying nothing. Many people, particularly in the UK, are able to, one morning, state calmly, "I have no need of faith-based belief" and never think about it again. They go on with their lives completely unperturbed by it, without a need to justify it, mull over it, or even occasionally sit down and wonder why they're here at all. If someone asks them what the meaning of life is without belief, they can easily say, "it doesn't matter, and I'm happy with that."

I don't believe people are endowed with certain inalienable rights. I recognize that established societies tend to adopt a responsibility for the base-line well being of most of their populace. The fact that most Britons aren't huddled starving in the streets attests to England's general success in that pursuit. But it is a pursuit, not an inherent responsibility. No geographical region Has to have defensible borders, nor does it have to establish a system of governance that looks out for the well-being of its inhabitants. And a lot don't.

But spiritual rights and privileges are immaterial. Yes, every believer has equal access to their god, but that does not fulfil their physical needs. Among those who believe, they will always believe that their deity is on their side, regardless if they are in direct conflict with another believer. Right and wrong, good and bad, are still just as contentious within the religious world, and the winner is not always the most good. Because being convinced that something is god's way doesn't make it right, or good, or useful. And being convinced something is evil doesn't make it bad. That's why institutions schism so frequently. Then of course one is invited to align with a belief structure that suits their principles, but where does that land them? If enough people don't agree with it they can change it? That means mortals are calling the shots. The fact that religions disagree, in my mind, undermines the entire concept. And as everyone believes that their sect is the most right, the Real One, the one everyone else should drop what they're doing and join...impasse, again. It's funny, really--or would be if it didn't make people so angry.

But I think that's my trouble with it, in a nutshell--it doesn't make people happy. It does not placate, it does not comfort, it is not an opiate. I broke through religion because I found it was an undue burden. I didn't like the way it told me to view myself, others, the church, or the functionality of the world. Indeed, the fundamentals of nature had nothing to do with it--it was me. There it was, in black and white, submit to, get down, obey men--I couldn't. I wouldn't. I knew it was wrong. I realized then and there, age 12, that this set of moral absolutes was a construct of mankind intended to suppress the individual from within. No matter what it says, even if I got to write the rules of my own religion according to what makes me happy it wouldn't work. I can't accept that any set of absolutes or free-standing instructions on how to live are anything more than one person's way of controlling the minds of others.

----

I realize that Fort Mill and the surrounding area are full of fundamentalist Christians, and you'll of course make plenty of them happy by trampling on the rights of women and severing our access to birth control and cancer screening, but believe it or not, it is not your job to protect evangelical Christians from being offended by the existence of Planned Parenthood. Planned Parenthood does not proselytize, it is not out to get you, and it is not staffed with baby-haters or rampaging atheists bent on world domination. They're there for the poor, the helpless, the scared, and the overwhelmed. They're there for women--a group it IS your job to protect. Your job is to ensure that people who are not causing harm do not come to harm. Not to ensure that the will of the mob is enforced on the maligned minority (or in the case of women, the traditionally abused majority).

You want to help prevent abortions? Ensure we have free, no-strings-attached access to contraception. Planned Parenthood provides this to women who can otherwise not afford it. Planned Parenthood gave me my IUD for free when I was broke, and it is to Planned Parenthood that I owe my freedom, my safety, and the fact that I've never needed an abortion. No one else in South Carolina offered me this. Nowhere else, aside from USC's student health center, could I find contraception I could afford.

You have to give us something. I don't care if contraception goes against your moral code--if you're not going to help poor women to have abortions, at least allow us to prevent unwanted babies. You will not make a woman want a child by taking away her ability to get rid of it. No woman seeks one out for fun. No woman thinks of abortion as a form of birth control. It's a last resort before your life is ruined. Before your Fundie parents begin beating you or throw you out of the house. Before you starve. Before you lose your job, your home, and your future.

You cannot force women who don't want children to abstain from sex. Sex is normal, natural, and important. Regular, satisfying sex is a vital component of mental health. Women enjoy it and should be proud of the fact that they do. Any religion that tells you otherwise is dangerous. Abstinence is not the solution. Psychological research has beaten this archaic notion down again and again. People don't, they never have, they're not supposed to. Give it a rest.

I've been in a monogamous relationship with the man I love for six years. I have always used protection, and I count on the IUD Planned Parenthood gave me. I've donated what I could to them every year since because I appreciate what they did. My friends' lives have been saved by the early detection Planned Parenthood cancer screening provided, both of the breast and the cervix. A PP practitioner even patched me up when I was injured.

By offering Prevention, Early Detection, and Termination Planned Parenthood has saved the USA millions, possibly billions of dollars on cancer treatments, complications of pregnancy, and legal fees. Planned Parenthood has made your job easier, and empowered women to live their lives without fear. If you kill Planned Parenthood, you know good and well that fear, abuse, and poverty will take its place.

Face it. The only reason to de-fund Planned Parenthood is misogyny. Do you hate women, sir?

Progress, or "My Bank Thinks Deportation is Funny"

2011-02-16T13:12:00.005-05:00

Dateline: 16 February, 2011. 10:30 AM. Lewisham.

My cell phone rings. It's a blocked number. I answer to hear the crisp, professional voice of a real live UKBA case worker. So excited and nervous I'm ready to pee myself, I convince myself to stay cool long enough to find out what the fellow needs.

It's about my bank statements. I had to supply documentation proving that for at least the 90 days prior to my application, I had at least £800 to my name. I had asked NatWest for this information back in November. November 19th, to be exact.

I'm normally happy to have my bank statements available online, and had opted out of having paper statements mailed to me because I'd just have to file them. So I walked down to my local branch and requested copies of my 3 most recent statements so I could include them.

I was told, after waiting in line for over two hours to speak to a poorly-trained receptionist, that they'd have to request them from on high and they would be mailed to me in 10 business days. I asked if they would include statements from up to the day I requested them and was told of course, I would have my most up-to-date information.

So when I received my statements on November 29th, I checked that they were all mine (they accidentally also sent me someone else's, with my name and address hand-written on the envelope) and dumped the whole pile of application materials into the post. Same day.

I then waited for three months.

Today my case worker informed me that the most recent statement was from 21 October, A month and 8 days away from my 29 November application date. I needed 8 days worth of statements to be within the acceptable timeframe to evidence my continued financial stability. Because some asshat at NatWest Corporate processed my request for my 3 most recent statements, then waited a week, in which my new statement came out, before sending them to me.

Well, no, probably a computer at NatWest Corporate automatically spat out my statements the moment they were requested, which then joined the "to be addressed and mailed" stack, which had to be done by hand by one work-experience kid who had no idea what he was getting himself into. Either way, it took over a week, and in so doing screwed me up rotten.

So. Return to today. The case worker tells me I can get a printout of my transactions for that week and have it stamped and signed for by a bank employee, and I can mail it to him. He gives me 5 working days to achieve this, otherwise he'll have to send my application off to the next stage as-is, and it may be rejected.

I go online and look up the phone number for my nearest branch--Lewisham. I call it and the phone is answered by Ricky who's happy to help. I explain that I understand that statement requests take at least a week and up to two to be processed, and I don't have that kind of time, so is it possible to get a print-out stamped and authorized by a bank employee? He says he can't handle that over the phone. I say I know, I'll be over there in ten minutes if it is possible, but please let me know if it can be done. He says I'm sorry, I can't handle this question on the phone. I say, seriously, I live in Crofton Park. I can be in front of you in ten minutes to handle it in person, please just let me know if it is a service you can provide. After several minutes of this he finally informs me that I haven't actually reached my branch, I've reached a call centre in the Midlands that handles branch inquiries. I ask if I can speak to someone actually at my branch and am told no. I tell him his job is useless and hang up.

As by this point it's nearly 11:30 and I know the lunchtime rush is about to get going at the Lewisham branch I opt to visit the Catford branch. I'm second in line at the inquiries desk and am seen quite quickly, which is a shock. I explain my situation and my request to the staffer, who tells me they don't do that. The only way I can get an official copy of anything is to request a statement that will be posted to my house in 7-10 working days. I tell him this is impossible, my right to live in this country hangs in the balance and I don't have that kind of time. Is there anything that can be done? I need it no later than Monday. He says this sort of thing is not valid and UKBA would not accept it anyway. I assure him that they would, that my caseworker--would you like to speak to him?--told me to ask for precisely this. He says no again, says he'll ask his manager, and stomps out of the room.

He comes back five minutes later, after audibly standing around chatting with other bank employees about their personal lives the entire time, slaps a folder on the table and says "I asked my manager and I am right. We cannot authorize a statement. It is illegal." I assure him that that is in no way true. He says he can print off copies of my statement on normal printer paper and I should submit those. I tell him that won't work, they have to be authorized, but he prints away anyway. He tells me that they can't because the signatures and stamps could be used for fraudulent purposes. I say okay, then can you authorize them and then send them to UKBA on my behalf? He gets even more annoyed and says no, that is completely illegal. I assure him that too is quite legal if I sign a release, and that way I don't get the opportunity to copy anyone's signature or official stamp. He tells me there is nothing that can be done, and it never has been done this way. I take my copies and return to the lobby.

I phone my case worker and tell him what has transpired. He expresses confusion and informs me that he has a dozen applications on his desk right now that are signed stamped printouts from NatWest, and they're perfectly legit. I tell him what I have, he says they might work, as long as there's an e-mail address at the bottom of the printout that someone can contact to confirm their validity. I inform him there is not, and in all honesty they look worthless even to me. He says to send them over and he'll give it a shot, but he may have to ask me to try again.

I ask another employee what the deal is and with barely-suppressed annoyance he explains that as of the first of the year branches have been given a directive to no longer authorize anything in person because of repeated instances of fraud. I ask if there's a central bank, a main bank that I could visit who would help me without needing to mail statements to me. He says nope. I state that my time limit is completely out of my hands and I must have something quickly or I'll be deported. He shrugs. I tell him to fuck himself and burst into tears.

After sweeping gracelessly out of the building I call Boy and explain the situation. He suggests, with impressive calm, that I go from branch to branch to branch for the rest of the day until I find someone who will help me. Try Greenwich. I plough onto a bus, cross town, take a number, and wait patiently while a bank employee cheerfully tries to up-sell a small business owner an account that includes mobile phone insurance and he politely but firmly rejects it. I'm seen soon and, with a level of calm and courtesy I didn't know I still had, explain that I understand my predicament but need an authorized document by Monday.

He smiles and says of course, I can get you an interim statement in 3 business days. What dates do you need it for? That'll be fine. You should have it by Monday. The international students at the University of Greenwich need these all the time for the border agency. And that's all requested, like I said, should be at your house by Monday. If you don't mind me asking, why do you need this? If you requested your most current information back in November it should have been fine.

I smile, shrug, say something must have gotten confused in the initial request, and exit the building. I phone my case worker again, and quickly say, "Hi, it's me again. I just wanted to let you know that I went to another branch and they said they'll send me an authorized document by Monday. And they didn't yell at me. I'll send it along as soon as I receive it." He thanks me and Boy arrives, having abandoned all hope of getting any work done with all his worrying about me. We wander around Greenwich Park for a couple hours, wave at the Royal Deer, make fun of the goth ducks, and generally let it go.

So. What have I learned. Don't go to the bank in Catford. Don't go to the bank in Lewisham. Take No for an answer then go somewhere else where you'll get a yes, or at least an "I'll help you." Bankers would rather see a customer deported than admit they don't know what they're doing. Visit banks near universities if your concern is student-related. Contact your MP if you have a sneaking suspicion your application has been misplaced. Tell your friends that if your application is rejected they can all be in your wedding--this may confuse the entropy gods. And whatever you do, DO NOT JOIN NATWEST.

Still Waiting

2011-02-15T05:54:00.003-05:00

I'm into week 12 of my long, lonely wait for UKBA to tell me...anything. Anything at all. A uni friend came over yesterday to use the phone (certain numbers can only be called from a landline in this country--it's weird) and discovered that she'll probably have a faster and easier time of getting the visa we both need if she goes back to New York and applies to the embassy. The New York UK Embassy is notorious for its impenetrability--you have to pay $12 to call a private company which will speak to you on their behalf, they don't allow in-person applications, you can't ask questions, and they don't answer emails. I had to send them my student visa application registered mail--from less than 12 blocks away. That said, they did turn the visa around in under a week, so maybe they know what they're doing.

Ben has contacted our MP to ask if she can shed any light on what the problem is. With all their recent and upcoming changes and the current downsizing kerfuffle I'm convinced my application has been misplaced, as surely after 3 months, when they claim their wait time is 3 weeks, I would have heard Something. By this point I should have either gotten a decisive No or a request for more information, or a request for me to go register biometrics or information on how I can go fuck myself. I imagine that when I call them in two weeks to ask what's going on the very curt receptionist will confirm that they received my application 29 November and I'll just have to be patient because frankly all hell has broken loose behind her and a pack of velociraptors has just eaten the mail clerk. Except she'll pronounce it clark.

Erm. Yes, MP. I sent her assistant information regarding my application--what it was, when I sent it, the weird bits that didn't make sense (it asking for a card I was forbidden from having) their stated wait times versus how long I've been waiting, the fact that all of my information is clearly valid and uncomplicated, and the recent announced changes. Hopefully she can ask someone if anything weird is going on, like how come all the biometric appointments are booked until the end of April, when the Tier 1 post-study work visa ceases to exist.

My American friends and I feel...hmm, what would be the most appropriate term? Fucked with. Yes, I think that sums it up nicely.

What it works out to is this. The UK is tired of non-English speaking foreign nationals coming in under student visas for dodgy or non-existent schools so they can get unskilled jobs that pay more than they would earn in their home country. I don't know if they're sending money back, as people claim Hispanic foreign nationals do re: the US, but they are seen as a problem. But rather than tackle the problem head-on and say "we've been having trouble with This country, This country, and This impoverished region and people are going to This fake school and This fake school and This school which turned out to be a Nike sweatshop," in all their well-meaning egalitarianism they've decided to turn out Everyone, including highly-educated English-speaking Americans.

Whenever America is included in the "other" category I get this sort of swell of imperialist outrage. How Dare you include me with those ruffians?! I'm not Foreign, I'm AMERICAN. *begin frothing at the mouth like the Gungan king in The Phantom Menace* I don't actually believe in American Exceptionalism at an intellectual level, but the US school systems do a pretty good job of ingraining the sentiment into one's very core. But I mean c'mon, if you have to call us Foreigners, at least make an exception for the Good foreigners... Who am I kidding. I don't care how they change their minds in the future just so long as they keep their word regarding what they said in the past. I paid a lot of money--more than I'm inclined to argue it's worth at this stage--for UKBA to do what they said they were going to do. And they haven't. At this point I'm beginning to want a visa And a refund, or a settlement for wages lost due to their negligence. I could be employed by now. Paying taxes. Paying off loans. Not just waiting to hear that my passport was accidentally shredded by Jeff the Neanderthal while he was wetting the plug to create sparks so he could burn my degree confirmation letter to stay warm.

Yes, I assume UKBA only hires extinct personnel. It's either that or believe members of my own species can be this incompetent, and I just can't bring myself to do so.

A Dab Here

2011-02-07T08:17:00.009-05:00

Pillow alcove and instrument collection. The window seat is lovely in the summer when you can open the skylight and lean your head back on the roof.

My desk and hobby paraphernalia. Before you wonder, the jars contain paint thinner and water, not urine.

The Giant Shelf. The vacuum cleaner box contains my landlord's non-functioning drag-behind model. The box is to the one Boy and I bought a few months ago which is an absolute powerhouse. And yes, Boy has more audio equipment than I can fathom a use for.

Room 3 of 7 (plus the stairwell) is now painted. The study was the first carpeted room, which added a bit of challenge, as well as the first one that had its ceiling refreshed. (As the room is mostly ceiling it seemed like a good idea.) The study also contains 2 of the 4 light fixtures I've replaced in this house, evidenced by the fact that you can't see a bare lightbulb on the ceiling or a broken fixture in the stairwell.

I listened to a recording of Pride and Prejudice, read for LibriVox by Karen Savage, for this room. As I stood on desks and chairs, covered my tattered jeans in paint, and bent myself into rather strange angles to reach all the nooks and crannies in this room I wondered just how quickly Mrs. Bennett would faint at the sight of me. Lydia and Kitty would certainly point and laugh, Mary and Jane would quietly disapprove, and Lady Catherine would slap me for disgracing myself, but I think Lizzie would probably give me a clandestine thumbs-up.

The ceiling in this room is only about 7' high so I only needed a desk chair to reach everywhere. The room is mostly edges and corners so I spent quite a long time staring cross-eyed at my flat artist's brush trying to smooth the ragged lines left by the masking tape. I had to patch about twenty holes in the ceiling before painting, and a few unfortunately need another coat of emulsion. Never trust spackle manufacturers' claims that their product does not drink paint!

-

Bathroom door and card catalogue. 'Cos, you know, we need to index things in here. I know it's a bit blurry but it's dismal out and the flash screws up the colour.

New taps I installed before my family got here for graduation. I think it's a hospitable gesture to ensure your guests can turn the water both on And off.

Our Floor-Soak Plus shower door, along with the airing cupboard doors I took a few liberties with. I selected the wall colour from the design on the tiles. I couldn't not, really. Thankfully it was featured in the Wickes "Landlord Chic" line, so I was able to get a good price on a water-durable formula.

The bathroom, paint job 2. I didn't really mean to paint this one as soon or as quickly as I did--I sorta launched into it at about 11pm the day we went to the hardware store and was mostly done about a day and a half later. The shade of yellow you see is actually indistinguishable from worn-out white under incandescent and compact fluorescent lighting, and unfortunately, England's natural lighting tends to leave something to be desired, so it took another week of tweaking at different times of day to get all the holidays filled.

The soundtrack to this room was Jane Eyre, also courtesy of a team of LibriVox volunteers, so I think I got more annoyed at the cracks in the walls than I probably should have. I nearly painted the doorframe yellow while yelling "come on Charlotte, don't be ridiculous--no sane 19th century waif would think God wanted her to volunteer in India!" Still, my fury with the book did keep me motivated.

-

The kitchen is down a few steps from the dining room, something I've never quite understood. Next door's kitchen is the same. The pantry is behind the kitchen door, too, so you have to waste time and effort waving both doors around in order to get anything out of there. I've considered taking the kitchen door off, but where would I store it? (If I ever find a place, I'm putting our crappy mattress in there too and getting a new one.)

Dining room seek-and-find! Do you see: 1 fedora? 2 computers? 3 glasses cases? 4 marine animals? The number 5? (Why do we keep our fiction library in the dining room, you ask? The bookshelves in the living room are for non-fiction, serials, and CDs, of course.)

The same room, the same paint, but without flash. This colour is very fun for that--it's completely dependant on the lighting. Sometimes it's red, sometimes it's orange, sometimes it's almost pink. Heart. We nicked the lanterns from my sister's wedding.

This was the first room I decided to paint, mostly because I kinda messed it up and needed to fix it. Some owner of the house many moons ago put an ugly-as-sin paper border up at chair-rail level, and some later, lazier owner elected to, rather than remove it, paint an attractive puke green over it. Later still someone painted over that with a sherbet pink, which was then covered with four or five coats of everyone's favourite Chunky White. This all happened, of course, years after someone hung the Decorative Lumps wallpaper that eventually became a structural element of the house. I couldn't do much about the lumpy walls, but the peeling, glaringly moronic painted border was downright nauseating. What can I say? I'm impulsive. I picked at it. Quite a bit. By the end of an hour I had a razor blade, a sponge and a bowl of water out and was carefully removing the ghastly thing from the entire room...which of course left me suddenly needing to paint. Whoops.

Charlaine Harris kept me company on this room with several Sookie Stackhouse novels, read by Johanna Parker. The whole scrubbing, patching, and painting process took about a week, and I typically listened through one book a day. If it weren't for all the gratuitous sex scenes the stories would belong firmly in the Early Teen section of the library--the characters are so simple and stupid it almost hurts. Every chapter includes at least two highly-detailed paragraphs of how Sookie gets dressed or what she's wearing, down to the last yellow ball earring. Still, Parker has an amazingly comforting southern accent (and does all the voices really well--when she reads phrases like 'Suddenly, out of the dark I heard,"I knew you'd be here, silly girl." It was exactly the voice I was dreading.' you can easily tell which character it is long before they're identified), and Harris always includes references to local food, customs, history, and behaviours that get me all nostalgic. That's not fair, Sookie, I can't get pickled okra here!

----
Gross words: Formula. Premium. Deluxe. Nugget.

Undirected Impatience

2011-02-03T18:25:00.000-05:00

As of two days ago I'm officially in limbo. My student visa has expired, but UKBA still has my passport and my post-study work visa application is "processing" (e.g. collecting dust in a locked filing cabinet shoved in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying "beware of the leopard.") I submitted my form just under 10 weeks ago, but they say they are currently reviewing applications submitted 3 weeks ago. Without my passport and a valid visa of some persuasion I have no evidence of my right to work in this country. I also have no idea if I have, or will have the right to work in this country. They have changed the application criteria but will not attempt to impose them retroactively, so at least I have that.

Since November I've painted two rooms of my house (both including baseboards and trim, one including ceiling), volunteered on 4 shows, graduated, fixed a silly little computer, installed new taps in the bathroom, applied for 10 jobs (just for fun, really) been rejected from 3 jobs (no surprise there, Ms. Dubious Work Visa), had some work done on the house, doodled a lot, fixed and made a few pieces of jewellery, and spent the rest of my time reading, staring at the wall, and kicking things. I've also tried to encourage my neighbours' cats to let me pet them when they play in my back yard (so far...no) and cleaned everything far too thoroughly. In short, if it weren't for the fact that I've been alone, I've been behaving like I'm on vacation. Except without the fun or the relief.

Two days ago a Royal Mail special delivery guy parked his van right in front of my house. He withdrew about a dozen small parcels from the back, checked his list...and then proceeded to efficiently deliver them all to twelve houses near mine before driving away. I was incensed. Wait a minute, Mr. Postman! Surely you see this is not fair! Jerkface.

Worried worried worried. I bet my passport made its way onto the black market and is currently being used by a Ukranian drug mule. My application is not remarkable, so why is it taking the same amount of time as the really complicated, distinctly dubious ones? Y'know, like the application submitted in Swahili for a completer of Oxford Street Unn-Iveristy so she may immigrate with her 9 children who are all men and older than her. Is Central really that unheard of? Laurence Olivier went there. As did Dame Judi Dench, all of the Redgraves, and Catherine Tate. It's not some mob-run diploma mill! What's wrong with my credentials? Why am I on the back burner? Did you find traces of LSD on the envelope? What else are post office employees supposed to do all day?

Erm..

sorry.

It's been too long for me to feel comfortable or safe. But I accidentally painted the cabinet that contains my suitcase shut and I'm not sure if I'll ever get it open again. Maybe it'll be fine. Maybe it really did fall down behind a cupboard, or Daisy Mae spilled her coffee on it and they've had to ask the US embassy to print me a new passport.

Yeah right. They'd totally make me pay for that.

Interesting Changes at UKBA

2011-01-25T10:58:00.002-05:00

So UKBA's website has undergone some heavy information updates in the past month, changes which would invalidate my application if they were retroactive. For sanity's sake I can't believe they would try it, as I submitted my form a month before they told anybody anything about them, but the office trying to learn the new criteria and evaluate applications differently based on their submission date could delay things. I'm trying to keep a cool head. I still have 8 of 10 fingernails.

As of December 22, everyone who is applying for Tier 1 and Tier 4 visas must have a biometric residence permit. This is a big change, as when I applied for my Tier 4 (Student) in 2009 I was told not only that I should not apply for one, but that I couldn't have one. Moreover, only Tier 1 (General) applications needed one at the time, and my application is under Tier 1 (Post-Study Work), a completely different form and set of criteria. I mentioned a few posts back that there was a weird confusing page on the application regarding BRPs, and now I see why.

I've read news that UKBA seeks to do away with the post-study work visa, which exists to provide a route to work for non-EU graduates, but that they haven't done so quite yet. One of their representatives was quoted recently saying "The fact that you've taken a class here does not give you the right to settle here" which makes me feel all warm and cozy. The message to graduates is clear: we want your obscenely-inflated tuition fees. We don't want you. I feel used.

The thing that really irks me about this is that it is pathetically inconsistent. A high school dropout from Poland who speaks no English and only understands the rudiments of lawnmowing has more of a right to be here than a native English speaking American with a Master's degree. Under current laws no one from the EU has to do anything at all to get a legal job, settle his or her family and put the kids in school, or even claim unemployment benefits in the UK, but Americans who paid for the right to even apply to be here, were subjected to intense scrutiny and prodding as to the validity of their identities and courses, paid extortionate tuition fees contrasted with their EU classmates, worked hard to earn a high qualification, and clearly had to be able to afford to fly here 'cos we sure as hell couldn't pack grandma in the Chevy and drive across the Atlantic are told clearly and flatly, "get out."

I know there are jerks out there who make up phony universities to provide an entry route to otherwise-unqualified migrants who just want to loaf around here. I realize that every country has its fill of useless freeloaders and shouldn't be obligated to take on other countries' bums. I know the standard of living is pretty attractive here, but the country can't afford to pay for every Joe Blow to mooch off its socialized services. I'm not that obtuse.

But eliminating the Post-Study Work Visa won't help you whittle down the number of bums who wind up here. Indeed, the whole reason the visa programme was developed was to ensure that only useful, qualified graduates could stay. I had to provide detailed letters from my school to prove I'd earned a real MA from a real, accredited university while here on a valid student visa. If a certificate of completion from Joe's Diploma Mill is making the cut it is a sign that you need to perform some internal corruption sweeps, not take away career opportunities from the highly-educated graduates your business community needs and your internal revenue service would appreciate. There are probably some highly-educated foreign graduates of British universities who could help you make them.

I'm not going to try and tell anyone what their laws should be, but I do believe the laws a country creates must be enforced fairly. If I'm not welcome, then Piotr shouldn't be either.

BBC rejection letter

2011-01-25T10:39:00.002-05:00

Ha! I just got a tersely-phrased automated rejection letter from the BBC for a gig I applied to in September. I figured that had happened about two months ago. Good to know Auntie is upholding her reputation for punctuality and efficiency.

I actually received an email about this in mid-December letting me know the short-listing process for the gig had been delayed due to schnumaya-hummana, and they would let me know something shortly. This letter described my reason for rejection similarly as schnumaya-hummana, or "we regret we are unable to provide more detailed feedback at this stage, but please apply again to another suitable role." It even provided a link to other jobs that could reject me based on my immigrant status.

Well hey, maybe this is a sign--not that my visa application will be accepted necessarily, but that pencil-pushers in the UK are finally back at their desks.

analytics, part 2

2011-01-24T11:27:00.004-05:00

I recently remembered I had a google analytics account. I tend to forget and leave it quietly ticking away to itself for months on end--partly because very few people read my writing, and partly because I still don't really understand what half of its data means. I check in, check that the usual states and countries have lit up, smile to myself, then log out and ignore it for another quarter. If I were trying to make money or promote something aside from my currently-useless résumé perhaps I would pay closer attention to it, but for now and for my needs it's little more than a nifty piece of technology.

There is something delightful, though, about clicking through the maps and playing "guess which friend read this month" based on the cities their IPs are routed through. Some are easy, some are bizarre. I tend to get a lot of accidental pageviews from India and former Soviet states, and my "motivated self-starter" posting from three years ago is actually the top entry if you Google the phrase. (I wonder how many HR recruiters stumble across That in an average month.) But the little orange dots over my friends' and family's towns generally account for the lengthiest site visits, a fact that both fills me with a funny sentimental pride and keeps me on my guard about writing anything too obnoxious or controversial. Based on the US data set I don't think my grandmother knows my URL, which can only be a good thing. It is amusingly helpful that everyone I know lives in different states. As long as Arkansas stays blank I think I'm safe (unless it's routed through Honolulu, or grandma secretly gets my postings printed off in Georgia and has them mailed to her.) None of my really controversial, deranged-sounding sentiments ever make it out of my living room, which is probably why I'm still employable.

The whole point I guess I can't avoid making is that I know at least someone is reading, but comments are rare. If you formulate an opinion about what I write, even if it's "damn you stupid" or "wow, that's offensive" please let me know. I'm slowly losing my mind worrying and waiting for UKBA to let me stay in England (they're trying to do away with the type of visa I qualify under--something I'm completely helpless against) and the opportunity to get into a heated, research-driven debate with someone over an inconsistency, prejudice, or other shortcoming in my discourse would do wonders to distract me from my current hand-wringing.

Speaking of which, I found out this weekend that a bat-shaped puppet Boy and I gave to his mother for her birthday has been introduced to her first graders as Ukba, winged guardian of the British Isles (may he grant asylum to the meek and cast out law-evaders with his golden trident). As many of her students' families are from overseas she restrained herself from adding "and if you're naughty, he'll send you home!" but she came close. That made my day.

Y'know what's cool? Compasses.

2011-01-19T13:15:00.003-05:00

I've been doodling a bit while waiting for my work visa application to process so I can apply for a National Insurance number so I can apply for a job. (I've also been reading and listening to many books, and cleaning my house, and when it's not raining, just wandering around.) I've always enjoyed rose windows, so it didn't come as a shock to discover that I also enjoy crop circles and take delight in figuring out how they're made. I'm not a maths whiz by any stretch of the imagination, but I do fancy a good pattern.

Also, this is my 350th posting on this blog. (I have 45 on my other blog but they're not nearly so angry or full of bile as this one.) Woo! It only took me 4 and half years.

Lire et Repondre

2011-01-18T11:37:00.005-05:00

A response to This which is itself a response to This but neither seem to bother referring to This:

The issue the folks over at Uncommon Descent fail to recognize, and a fact the folks over at Pharyngula have failed to bother mentioning, is that one's views on theology are irrelevant to this debate. Neither theism nor atheism nor anything in between have any impact on one's views regarding his or her own species. Indeed, some atheists are certainly more protective of their species than many religious people, just as some religious people can justify their value for progeny without any regard for their sacred texts. The issues are neither mutual nor exclusive.

What Might affect one's answers to the questions, however, are other, lighter -isms--I'll be focusing on humanism, anarchism, pragmatism, and capitalism, which I think are practiced by athe- and the-ists in roughly equal proportions. These -isms are a level closer to one's daily life than the great question of Where the Universe Came From. The moral codes upheld by each different group will provide clearly different answers to the questions. (For the sake of this discussion, the term Moral will be used in its purest form--adherence to the rules, bylaws, or expectations of a particular institution.)

Without further ado: the answers to the questions according to different philosophical sub-groupings, assuming the person answering is an atheist or religion-neutral. Answer set 1. Humanists.

(a) Do you believe that a newborn baby is fully human? Yes.

(b) Do you believe that a newborn baby is a person? Yes.

(c) Do you believe that a newborn baby has a right to life? Rights are codes of conduct established by human cultures to ensure that everyone has a fair shot at happiness, so if we affirm that the baby is human and we acknowledge our society's codes, the codes apply to it. Yes.

(d) Do you believe that every human person has a duty towards newborn babies, to refrain from killing them? The survival of our species is our responsibility and no one else's. If we want our species to continue to exist, we must ensure the next generation is born and raised to fend for itself.

(e) Do you believe that killing a newborn baby is just as wrong as killing an adult? Yes. Rightness and wrongness in terms of the species are absolute. We must responsibly maintain and promote the survival and happiness of everyone in our species who is beneficial to it.

Answer set 2: Anarchists.

(a) Do you believe that a newborn baby is fully human? Yes, but so's the Unabomber. The fact that they contain a full set of homo sapiens sapiens genes doesn't mean anything about them.

(b) Do you believe that a newborn baby is a person? If they can't think for themselves, no. Person-hood is awareness.

(c) Do you believe that a newborn baby has a right to life? No one has an inherent right to anything. It is of course arguable that since no-one has the right to live, no one has any more right than anyone else to live, but it doesn't mean the beginning of life is special or should be protected. If the baby's parents want to keep it alive, that's their concern.

(d) Do you believe that every human person has a duty towards newborn babies, to refrain from killing them? Again, they have no more or less right to live than any other living thing. I don't have the right to kill it, but it doesn't have the right to be alive.

(e) Do you believe that killing a newborn baby is just as wrong as killing an adult? Rightness and wrongess are social constructs intended for the training and control of children. Thinking individuals must determine what is best for themselves--no set of codes or absolutes should dissuade them. It is not up to me to decide how you live or think. If it is best in your situation to do away with an adult or a child, that is your concern. Only when the person in question is me or someone who I'd rather keep alive does it become my problem. The total human population size is thoroughly irrelevant.

Answer set 3: Pragmatists.

(a) Do you believe that a newborn baby is fully human? Yes, it has the same genetic sequence as adult humans.

(b) Do you believe that a newborn baby is a person? A person is a thinking, productive member of society, so no.

(c) Do you believe that a newborn baby has a right to life? Babies of course have potential value--as workers, thinkers, and functional members of society--but none of that is actualized. Until the child has begun to exhibit some cognitive and physical function with which it can provide for itself or others it actually has negative value. It occupies the attention and energy of others (its parents, teachers, babysitters, and the like), it consumes food and requires heating, space, and shelter, which require energy to produce, and yet it does not contribute to its society in return. We of course assume that at some point in its future that it will begin to make this contribution, but we have no guarantee that this will be so. As long as its value is not calculable, it is impossible to determine if the child has any.

(d) Do you believe that every human person has a duty towards newborn babies, to refrain from killing them? It depends on the actual value of the baby in question. Since that cannot be determined, and because all newborns have equal potential to be useful or detrimental to society one cannot decide if their lives should be preserved in any absolute terms.

(e) Do you believe that killing a newborn baby is just as wrong as killing an adult? Not as wrong as killing an adult whose usefulness or benefit to the species is greater than their consumption, but more wrong than killing an adult who causes damage to the species or consumes more than they produce. Either way, much more time and energy has gone into creating the adult than the infant, so it is less of a waste of time and work to lose an infant than a functioning, useful adult. Though after an adult has outlived his usefulness, he is functionally worth less than the infant, for his lifetime energy consumption exceeds his current productiveness, whereas the infant's energy consumption and output are both low.

Answer set 4: capitalists.

(a) Do you believe that a newborn baby is fully human? Irrelevant--people buy accessories for their cars and treats for their dogs. You do not need to be fully human to be a part of our economy. We have machines that budget for and buy accessories for other machines--in my view they are just as human as a homo sapiens who does the same task.

(b) Do you believe that a newborn baby is a person? Person-hood is directly related to one's contribution to the economy, so as long as its needs contribute to the economy, yes. It may not be doing the purchasing, but money must be spent on its behalf, which means extra money must be earned by an adult or caretaker than the adult would need on his or her own. Even in utero the baby is a person, provided its pre-natal care is paid for with insurance or out of pocket.

(c) Do you believe that a newborn baby has a right to life? Depends who's paying. If the parents' insurance premiums are paid up and the birth doesn't require extra money on the behalf of the state or the citizenry, the baby owes its life to its parents and it is their right to decide if it deserves it. If the parents depend on welfare or expect the hospital to eat the cost, the child owes its life to the generosity of its community and it should be their right to decide if it deserves it.

(d) Do you believe that every human person has a duty towards newborn babies, to refrain from killing them? Again, it's a matter of cost/benefit ratio. These days keeping them alive requires more money than the alternative, but this was not always so, nor is it so in some cultures. If the child in question is considered a commodity, do you believe it will sell for more than the net cost of feeding and clothing it while in your possession? Or if you don't intend to sell it, what is the cost of educating it, contrasted with the purchasing power that education may lead to? If more money is likely to be spent on it than it will likely earn for itself or you, then no.

(e) Do you believe that killing a newborn baby is just as wrong as killing an adult? An adult who is current on his mortgage, working 40 hours a week at $20/hr or higher, paying off his student loans at at least 8.5% interest, has at least one car loan in good standing and has spent at least $15,000 cash for a wedding has far more value than a normal baby who has cost at most $15,000 in extra food for its mother, pre-natal care and delivery. If the child is unwell but the parents have cash in hand for just such an incident it may be worth the same as a starter home, which is good for the hospital, but still not the same value as a fully-functioning worker. Indeed, if the pregnancy has removed the child's mother from the workforce for any length of time then the child on whose behalf leave was taken has negative value to the mother's employer, particularly if she qualifies for paid maternity leave. After ten years of life a typical child generally has consumed revenue equal to the value of one pre-owned boat or the employment of 3 college graduates for two years. That said, if the child was produced using in-vitro fertilization or another atypical method then by the time of birth their net value may be equal to or higher than a ten year old, particularly if the parents required more than three cycles for it to take. Though then that does bring into question the value of the individual live birth against the pricey but ultimately non-viable embryos(...) no.

Answer set 5: Me.

PZ Myers never said anything about newborn babies' right to life. He just said they weren't people. They aren't--they're genetically human, but they don't think, evaluate, or even have personalities for quite some time after they're born. At three weeks of age a kitten has a more distinct personality than a three-month old human, but this does not mean that the kitten will ever become a person, or the baby will ever become a cat. As soon as the baby's comprehension extends beyond the flavour of its toes it will embark upon the long, difficult transition into person-hood (something I would argue doesn't really set in until around age 22).

Rights are in fact a social construct intended to ensure that laws are enforced equally across all sectors, though this rarely occurs. People's rights, adult and child, are infringed upon constantly. My right to pursue happiness as I see fit is often infringed upon by other people's pursuit of the same thing--and indeed, this is not only unavoidable, but necessary. Rights are an abstraction, and a fairly loose one at that. We may safely state that rights are endowed by the state and may be taken away at any time by the state because let's face it, the truth of 'rights' extends just as far as the truth of 'government of the people, by the people, and for the people.'--e.g. just as far as you can suspend your disbelief. (Riiiiight. No no, the people are in charge. And the ongoing war effort demanded, maintained, and prevented from ending by Haliburton? Fully backed by the people.)

Point is, one's relationship with religion does not directly impact his or her relationship with government, humanity, or even the planet. Jumping to the conclusion that all atheists think alike is the kind of simple-minded knee jerk reaction you'd expect out of a god-botherer.

(see what I did there? it's funny! Because I made myself look like a knee-j...oh, you got it. Sorry.)

Come on, BBC

2011-01-05T05:49:00.006-05:00

UPDATE 9/01/11: Thank you, Ben Goldacre, for your ability to talk to the right people and find the right numbers. The real story: 584 failures out of 1.355 Million users.

Almost exactly TRIPLE the number in 2005, which I cited as a conservative estimate in any case.

----

I just read THIS shock-and-alarm article.

Part 1. Understanding Statistics.

Yeah, did you read the whole thing? 584 unintended pregnancies...out of the entire user base...in 11 years.

Eleven years.

Implanon contraceptive devices have demonstrated a failure rate of .05% in clinical trials. 1 in 2000 users may become pregnant. 14 women involved in a lawsuit cited in the above article hadn't even been wearing one--their doctors missed, and nobody noticed. Human error happens--when I got an IUD it took 3 tries--3 IUDs--to get one to fit because I stupidly consented to letting a supervised trainee insert it. (Oh the unimaginable agony. Seriously. Still makes me flinch, and that was three years ago. I don't know how any woman would consent to giving birth, let alone more than once.) So of the 584 failures, probably about 5% had nothing to do with the device at all. It was human error compounded with negligence, exhaustion, or poor eyesight.

The article does not mention the whole number of implant users over the past 11 years, just mentions that it is popular. So I've been looking it up. The NHS National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) reported that, as of 2005, 3% of women age 16-49 were using an implant, and the only one licensed for use in the UK is Implanon. (helpful) So. I asked the department of statistics what those deets were--14 million women were aged between 16 and 49 as of the 2001 census. I'd imagine that number has grown considerably, but that's the most recent official data. The CIA world factbook bets the UK has 20 million women between 15 and 64, or probably closer to 17 million women of childbearing age.

So. As of 2005, 3% of, let's be reasonable and say 15 million used an implant. 450,000 women that year.

This is not the same as the number of implantations, as the implant is intended to be replaced every 3 years.

This is also not the total number of women who have used it since it was introduced in 1999, which IS the non-existent data set the "oh the humanity!" articles are citing.

I am certain hundreds of thousands more users have existed or currently exist. Merck does not seem to have any sales figures or total-usage-per-country statistics available, and NICE suggests that they don't really know how many women have gotten them, how many times.

The usage rate cited was accurate for the device being available for 5 years. It has now been available--and gaining in popularity--for over 10. Usage may have doubled. Anyone with better data please let me know.

But this is the data I have. okay. .05% failure rate. 250 pregnancies allowable per 450,000 users. we're out by 350. This is clearly an epidemic and the drug should be taken off the shelves.

Except.

The failure rate is for perfect use, when neither doctor nor patient is a moron. If you read the relevant trial data you'll find that about half the failures associated with the implant were in fact pregnancies that were already under way. Implanon is not a day-after pill and is not marketed as such. Patient didn't know she was pregnant, urine test came up with a false negative, implant went ahead, statistical fail. Okay, do blood and urine tests before implantation. Zing. Other failures were pregnancies that appeared to have started within a week of insertion. Apparently the patient was so excited to go try it out she didn't hear when the doctor said "give it two weeks to get into your system. If you've already ovulated, this will not retroactively prevent egg release. Hold your horses until you've had your next period." Not an indication of the drug failing to work as it says on the tin.

Still others cited well-known drug interactions (many of which were not mentioned until after the discovery of a pregnancy), poorly-inserted implants, and morbid obesity as reasons for failure (and undetected pregnancy, both for visual and chemical reasons). The device is intended as a one-size-fits-most, and if your body needs more, your doctor should notice that when you show up. These are still not faults of the drug or even its distribution method, but failures in staff training.

It is a common medicine, but that doesn't mean it shouldn't be taken seriously--it should only be administered by trained, informed medical practitioners who understand how it will work for each individual patient. I'm sorry, but "the doctor prescribed it to me even though I'm too fat for it to work" is not a fault of the product, it is a fault of the doctor. There are other things that will work for the obese, such as IUDs and local-absorption products such as the Ring.

Most of the complaints, of the 584 cited by the BBC, were apparently device-expulsion related. Yes, bodies do that. They don't like foreign objects embedded in them. It's why piercings sometimes disappear (my sister had an eyebrow piercing suddenly and painlessly vanish. The ring just fell off in her hand. True!) and how splinters quietly slip away. If the device is properly implanted subcutaneously this is less likely to happen. Again, Human Error. If the damn thing falls out, and you run off and get knocked up anyway, don't blame the device. Blame your stupid self for not calling your doctor immediately and saying "look bitch, the damn thing fell out" and using condoms until you can get it re-inserted properly.

There may have been a few people for whom the drug just didn't work. I'm sure there are. And people have gone off it for reasons such as weight gain, headache, mood changes, and desire to have children. Some people have expressed anger about scars the IMPLANTED BIG PIECE OF PLASTIC GOD DAMN DO YOU LISTEN TO YOURSELF WHEN YOU SPEAK? left after removal. These are all well-documented risks that you should discuss with your doctor in a pre-insert session so you can determine if this is the right birth prevention method for you.

The 584 pregnancies are not statistically relevant. They should not deter women who wish to prevent pregnancy from using this product.

Part 2. Why I'm Angry.

I'm not surprised to see the BBC's health team cite piss-poor statistics again. Every time an issue regarding medicine or public health comes up they manage to completely blow it out of proportion, be completely wrong, or simply not understand the scientific relevance of the data they're citing, pro or con. Their statistical analysis team is pathetic, probably because it's one high school-aged intern in a windowless room with an unrestricted internet connection (for medical research, after all) and an HD monitor for better porn viewing. They're usually wrong, and if they're not wrong, they're exaggerating, and if they're not exaggerating, it's not relevant.

Nevertheless, they have a responsibility to uphold when it comes to issues of public health, particularly family planning issues. (don't you hate that term? 'family planning--of course everyone plans to have a family someday, just not right now!' what about 'family prevention' issues? That's my kind of term.) The BBC is the most respected news provider in the world. What they write gets read and trusted.

Most people do not read news articles' statistics with an air of complete unbelief. Most people do not have the time or patience to check their facts and figure out where their numbers are coming from, or are composed of. Most people just read "600 pregnancies! This stuff is useless! I'll never waste my money on it, no way. I'll trust my good sense." Not realizing that it's 600 out of hundreds and hundreds of thousands, not realizing that most of the failures are in fact unrelated to the medicine entirely, not realizing that this news is not newsworthy. It's the 5th most popular story on their site today. The BBC is affecting people's judgement with their pure, unadulterated idiocy. Some dumb teenage girls who were considering an implant may now decide to try their luck without, ('cos hey, you know what's smart? teenagers.) because Doofus in the office wanted to make a sensational headline. Or they'll go with the Estrogen/Progesterone combi pill, which has over 60 years worth of reported side effects and time-sensitive dosage related failures to its name.

This insert is one of dozens of medicines which have emerged in response to the regular failures of the original pill. We know it sucks. It works, but at such a cost as to make it not worthwhile to many people. The daily pills at exactly the same time; the weight-gain, the bloating, the depression, the nausea, the acne, the drug interactions, the fibroids, the migraines...it's all well-reported. Is Implanon the be-all fix? Of course not. We can always strive to improve it, and there's plenty of other options that work well for plenty of women. I'm happy with a non-hormonal IUD. In 10 years I'll have to get another one, but hopefully by then the fear will have passed. But the point is, it is hugely irresponsible for the BBC to wag its ass around bad-mouthing what are, even where they aren't perfect, clear improvements on the old medicine. It is stupid to try and shock the public into mistrusting a drug which is far more trustworthy than most alternatives, including Old Reliable.

The new drugs have developed because people figured out how to do things better, even if the primary improvement needed was in the patient herself. Implants and IUDs don't have different numbers in the 'perfect use' and 'typical use' columns. Because they don't rely on a normal human brain with a normal memory and normal habits to keep them working. If you miss one Pill, even by a few hours, your entire month is wasted. That's not reliable, even if the chemical in them technically is.

Implanted hormonal birth control is the best option for teenagers--it's low-dose so it doesn't screw with their brains or bodies too much, it steadily delivers, they don't have to think about it, it may slightly lower libido which could help them focus in school, and as IUDs may slightly increase your likelihood of contracting an STI if you sleep around they're a better bet for kids with poor impulse control or who get pressured by stupid boys out of using condoms.

Throwing teen girls directly into daily pill regimens does not teach responsibility. It relies on a responsibility that is usually absent--a dearth which is likely to have devastating consequences. Our state and culture should encourage usage of thought-free birth control for girls. The Pill has gone the way of the Studebaker--the clunky, awkward old technology without anti-lock brakes, crumple zones, or airbags. Birth control needs to keep you safe from yourself as well as others, which pills cannot be relied upon to do--particularly when you're in situations (lake house weekends) where sexual activity is likely (the whole reason you're there.)

----

I also believe our state and culture should encourage teenage through college-age boys and girls to think that buying condoms is coooool. It's just not right that it's so awkward to go to the student health centre and see the big fishbowl full of brightly-coloured prophylactics on the desk next to the kind-eyed elderly receptionist. "I..I want them, I know they're there for us, there's even a heart-shaped sign on the front that says 'Take what you need!' but...but...what if she's a widow? What if she hasn't had any in like, half a century? What if she's judging me, or jealous? How am I going to get any good use out of these if all I can think about is the old condom lady?" I remember gingerly taking a couple on my way out one day after having my arse x-rayed, just because I can't resist free stuff, and she looked at me, smiled, and said "Always the girls taking those. I don't think the boys can face me for them, but I've always insisted on having them out for you kids. Be safe!" I smiled as I left the building--my bruised but not broken coccyx still aching--then shuddered at the idea of ever using Sweet Old Lady Condoms.

Oh Mr. Darcy!

2010-12-05T12:32:00.003-05:00

I've been reading a lot lately (see previous post about work visa application) and, because they're free and readily available, I've found myself nose-deep more than my fair share of 19th century British novels. In the past few weeks I've read Jane Eyre, The Woman in White, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, Sense & Sensibility, and a few Sherlock Holmes short adventures. I think Middlemarch will be my next undertaking, though I'm a bit daunted by the first page.

With the exception of the Holmes stories and Alice, my text choices have been largely...similar. Strikingly so. Without meaning to, I wonder if I haven't chosen the three most similar narratives ever written. Perhaps this similarity would not be quite so pronounced to me if I hadn't chosen to read all of them in sequence, but while I've enjoyed all three to a similar extent, the same difficulties have dampened my enjoyment to the same extent in all. I'd like to document these themes here--of plot and language most particularly--for my own future reference. As a reader, you may find this dull, as this is a posting wherein you may find my thoughts, not my fury.

Similar Plot Points and Characters in Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre, Wilkie Collins's The Woman in White, and Jane Austen's Sense & Sensibility

-All three involve at least one young woman being bedridden and on the verge of death because of illness, but no men. Jane Eyre, Marian Halcombe, and Marianne Dashwood catch some form of stress/hanging out in the rain-related disease.

Likewise, clearly-doomed girls (the excessively-innocent ultra-pious who talk about how lovely death would be) Helen Burns (Eyre) and Anne Catherick (White) spend some time bedridden before kicking it.

-All 3 protagonists are between age 17 and 20, and all marry men between age 35 and 40. Each marriage must be for love, because though the women are all of high birth (Jane Eyre unknowingly) the men they marry are handicapped in some way. Edward Ferrars (Sense) has lost the bulk of his inheritance, Edward Rochester (Eyre) has been blinded and lost a hand in the destruction of his manor house, and Walter Hartright (White) is sickeningly middle-class, and Laura lost her fortune when her (deceased) first husband declared her dead and stole it. While everybody is still fairly wealthy at the end, they all lose a significant investment or holding.

-All three are caught up in inheritance issues equalling or exceeding £20,000.

-All three involve a nasty elderly woman who screws things up royally for the protagonist with her selfishness. (Mrs. Reed, the Countess, Mrs. Ferrars)

-All three involve one major female character being pressured by a guy that she doesn't like to marry him. (St. John Rivers, Colonel Brandon, Sir Percival Glyde) Only Brandon's pressure ends in something resembling love and financial stability.

-All three involve at least one pair of close, affectionate, inseparable sisters, and it is generally understood that there's a prudent one and a pretty one. (Marian and Laura, Elinor and Marianne, Diana and Mary Rivers) At least one of the sisters has a Mary-based name.

Similar Thematic Elements in the aforementioned text group

-The female protagonist through who's eyes much of the story is told is invariably well-educated, exceedingly honest and forthright, and never makes a statement or decision that is not perfectly well-justified both to her religion and her caste. She likewise spends a lot of paper justifying her decisions and statements to the audience, imploring us to realize that they're being utterly selfless in all things and are only seeking to do what is best for everyone involved.

-People who start high end in the middle. People who start in the middle end with a compromised version of high.

-Women who have choices they can make are just as likely to make ones that cause them harm as good, because they must consider what is righteous regardless of their best interests. Jane Eyre nearly goes to India, where she's sure to die within days of arrival of disease or heat-stroke, because she knows that God would want her to be a missionary. The only thing that stops her is she also knows that God would not want her and St. John to marry without loving each other. Likewise, Laura Fairlie marries Sir Percival, despite the fact she doesn't like him, because she agreed to the engagement to please her father on his death-bed, and it would be shameful to break it. Elinor Dashwood, meanwhile, keep's Lucy's secrets, despite how badly they hurt her and despite how useful it would be to disclose them, because she promised she would. Virtue always wins over self-interest and intelligence.

Similar Endings in the aforementioned

-Everybody gets married.

-Everybody has babies, or there's hints of babies.

-All the women fall into their roles as subservient wives, though they had the capacity to be powerful and respectable women in their own right.

Similar Things That Piss Me Off in the aforementioned

The ladies always have the option of doing something deemed vaguely improper but better for everyone--and always decline. The authors, rather than congratulating their heroines for their good deeds, make things kinda suck for them as a consequence, but they nevertheless feel better in their hearts for having done what was socially accepted, in spite of the fact that no sensible person around them would have done the same.

Jane Eyre clearly acknowledges that Bertha Mason is not really Mr. Rochester's wife, as she's not only batshit but hell-bent on Mr. Rochester's immolation, but rather than see what is an unfortunate circumstance and run off to the south of France as his beloved mistress (while maintaining Bertha's safe upkeep), which would ensure everyone's estates and safety, she runs off to develop pneumonia and endure abuse under St. John, and lets Bertha burn the house down and severely handicap Rochester. Her virtue screwed her over and left her with half an estate and half a man. Jane grins and bears it, and Brontë seems to think she got off no better than she should have.

Laura Fairlie will be coming into possession of £20,000 in under the space of a year, and her guardian is a douchebag. But rather than refuse to marry Sir Percival until her finances are hers to control, she does what the men around her want, because that's 'right,' and loses everything. Had she said "hey buddy, let's wait 6 months" the story probably wouldn't have happened, but she would not have wound up with the line in her will that gave him everything upon her death (she probably would not have wound up married to him at all) so Marian probably wouldn't have gotten typhus, she wouldn't have wound up in an asylum, and neither the Count or Sir Percival would have wound up dead. Had she taken this one step in her best interest everyone, even the jerks, would have been better off.

Had Mrs. Dashwood stood up for herself against her stepson after her husband's last wishes were for him to provide for her and her daughters, they could have moved somewhere besides the little cottage their income afforded them. They really don't meet anyone that great or helpful on account of it, Marianne wouldn't have had to endure the BS that was Willoughby, Elinor could have been in money enough for Mrs. Ferrars to approve of her relationship with Edward, and Lucy probably would have wound up with Robert anyway but with less money to taunt Elinor with. But no, Mrs. Dashwood doesn't seem to think it's proper to say "look, buddy, I know you're a sucker and your wife's a bitch, but you're not weaseling out of your obligation to your family." so Marianne wound up with a "putrid fever." Bleh.

Atheists Love Christmas too!

2010-12-03T12:47:00.004-05:00

Why do you want to take the holiday season away from me, theists? I'm just as cold as you, and is that not provocation enough to seek warmth and good cheer with the people I love? (Did you know atheists can love? When it is reciprocated it is the best feeling on earth. It is real--a bond between two real people, not two people and their shared imaginary friend, which, let's face it, is creepy.) Even your official church documents acknowledge that the birth of your saviour (who was elected saviour, what, 300 years after his alleged lifetime?) could have really been anytime--nobody's sure or gives a hoot, but these Pagans have a pretty good party scheduled for mid-December, so that seems a good a time as any. We've already put a damper on their fertility festival in the spring, might as well ruin the mead-and-fire party too.

Yesterday I had the privilege of seeing the website of Boss Creations which sells "CHRIST-mas" trees--£300 artificial douglas firs with a giant neon cross glowing from within like a...well, like nothing else. Take a moment and google it. Go on. I'll wait.

...it is always nice to see you says the man behind the counter to the woman coming inside, she is shaking her umbrella...doo-doo du-doo dut-dut du-doo...

Yep. Did you notice the red white and blue "Christian Nation" pile of offense? Why has no one told these people that the USA is neither Christian nor even religious? It's not. Really. America does have an official anthem, an official seal, an official flag, and an official football team but it does not have, and has never had, an official religion or a recognition or sanction of any religion of any kind. Them's the rules. Like 'em or leave.

Wait, what, am I pulling their own bullshit to serve my ends? "like it or leave" eh? them's fightin' words! (especially from an ex-pat) But seriously. It is so brazenly disrespectful of the nation for a religious group who seeks daily to remove the rights of everyone who disagrees with them--Feminists, minorities, Muslims, homosexuals, Blacks, the educated--to arbitrarily decide that the country *actually* is Christian and Naughty People are trying to take it away and punish them for their beliefs. How Dare you try to undermine the truth of what makes the USA so remarkable? How Dare you try to impose your theistic law to the land, while simultaneously condeming other nations for doing precisely the same thing with a different religion?

How Dare you suggest that because other people want to be festive in December that we're not only trying to outlaw your obsolete religion, but trying to make it mean something it doesn't?

Christmas is a religious takeover of the winter solstice celebration. It began as a celebration of light on the longest, darkest night of the year in the hemisphere. It still is for many millions of people. It is a time to be warm. It is a time to be together. It is a time to celebrate our survival so far and to hope our friends and families keep living until spring. That's the long and short of it.

All that December 25 birth of your saviour bullshit? You Made It Up. Just like your deities and your nonsensical rules and your ban on mixed-fiber fabrics. It's shit. Admittedly, it's old shit, but that doesn't make it right. You hurt my feelings by trying to tell me I can't celebrate at this time of year because I'm not one of you. By telling me I can't send cards wishing people good cheer because they don't have angels on the cover and verses overleaf. That I can't give people gifts simply to warm their hearts, not because it represents something in your thought-control system.

I am insulted. As an American I feel like I bend over backward for you far too often, let you have your way far more than is necessary or right. This is a time of togetherness. If the only way you can unify your flock is to convince them there's bad guys out to get them, maybe you should re-evaluate why you're together.

Me? Me.

2010-12-03T10:17:00.002-05:00

I have finished my MA. It's official, I have my letters and results. Yadda yadda. NatWest were true to their word and sent me my bank statements on Monday. I checked through my application, signed and dated it, and put it in the post. I also sent a birthday card to my dear grandmother. They put this gigantic gold stamp on it to send to the US, which was pretty nifty. I hope she likes it.

I checked with the post office and saw that as of yesterday evening the parcel had been signed for. I checked my bank account today and saw that I'm officially £550 poorer. I think they got it.

Oof. I'm now broke. I just went ahead and canceled my gym membership and Boy has agreed to take over my chunk of the rent and council tax until I can find a job. I'm such a filthy freeloader. Hopefully I'll have a visa soon, maybe even before February, and will apply like mad to get a job and start paying for myself again like a real grown-up. At this point I really don't care what the gig is, so long as it's out of the snow.

I filled out the form truthfully and fully, though there was this one bit that made me uncomfortable. The form indicates I must include my Biometric Residence Permit, and write its number and expiration dates and such in the space provided. My application will be deemed incomplete and will be returned to me without this data and official card. I never received a Biometric Residence Permit. I'm a Tier 1 (Post-Study Work) applicant here legally on a Tier 4 (Student) visa. Neither of these categories are included in the Biometric Residence Permit scheme, and indeed, when I checked the Border Agency website, I discovered I am Forbidden from applying for a Biometric Residence Permit. Yet the Tier 1 (Post-Study Work) visa application is incomplete without one and will be rejected out of hand. I assume this is a clerical error and I'll be fine, but it about scared the pants off of me.

The Border Agency website also informs me that there's a 6-week wait time before applications are considered. They're currently considering applications submitted on or before October 13. Yay. I feel naked without my passport. And my overcoat.

My neighbourhood is sitting in about 6" of snow right now, and the sidewalks are coated in two-inch thick mirror-smooth ice. At the time of writing it is just past 4:30pm and pitch black outside. Now is the winter of my discontent. Or at least my griping about the weather. Sheez. One day I hope to be wealthy enough to have a winter home somewhere closer to the Tropic of Cancer. Not even somewhere particularly nice, just Not Here. Hell, it'd be great if we could just have a Winter London somewhere south of here, maybe in northern Algeria. It's not like they need...oh wait, I'm starting to sound like an imperialist. Oof, at least now I understand where they get it from.

Cold cold cold cold. I was so optimistic when I set the heat timer. Yeah, the house will be tolerably warm until 6:30, you don't need to waste money on gas until then... yeah right.

I think it's funny how, when you're cold or hungry, that's all you can think about. You could be the cleverest person alive, but as soon as the heat dries up the only thoughts you can muster are "Cold! Hey stupid, yeah you up there! Toes, fingers, legs, and nose agree--cold! You know what's great? Warm. Find warm. Oh, and by the way--Cold." It's like the body stages a coup d'intellect. The only ideas my id will let through are pictures of socks and instructional videos on how to open the airing cupboard and switch on the boiler. Okay! Okay, I'm going...

(toes cheer)

Republicans and why I'm not going back (Incoherent Rant)

2010-12-02T11:38:00.005-05:00

You have got to be f'ing kidding me. You can't f'ing hold the f'ing congress hostage like that--saying you won't vote for necessary social progress until you let the wealthy have unnecessary increases to their wealth contrasted with the rest of the population. This is Nonsense. What the hell is going on?

Why aren't people rioting?

Get it together, middle class! The American Aristocracy is working very hard to take your rights, your health, your food, your jobs, and your freedom away, and yet you're not gathering stones? There is no more room for debate. There is no more room to let the wealthy and their doting pawns laugh at you while trampling over your votes, your liberties, and your self-interests. They have never listened to you, they will never compromise or consider reason, they don't give a wet slap about equality, the Constitution, or civil liberties. START THROWING THINGS.

Oh middle-class Republicans. They're stupid enough to believe their representatives when they tell them continuation of tax cuts for the wealthy and cutting services to the poor will help them in the long run. They think Wall Street deserves every cent it earns, despite Everything, as they hope to one day enjoy a portion of that money if they play by the rules. That they will one day fulfil the American Dream and be one of the wealthy fat cats at the top--and gee, when I'm rich and famous, I sure won't want to pay taxes so the poor can survive the winter! These hope-blind sheep are proud enough to think that the poor don't deserve anything, and ignorant enough to disregard simple truths about poverty.

Being poor and living like you're poor are only likely to continue your poverty, and the poverty of your children. It is very difficult to pull yourself out of poverty, particularly when you're born into it, regardless of how many or few government handouts are available to you.

Poor people toe a fine line between fed and housed and hungry on the streets. The difference between 'sandwich' and 'no sandwich' is the difference between 'law-abiding citizen' and 'violent criminal.' Ask Haiti. You can't starve people, offer them nothing, keep them unhealthy, and prevent them from providing for themselves and expect your society to survive. Ask South Africa under Apartheid. Y'know, all those nice lovely middle-class homes surrounded by chain-link fences and razor wire. That's what happens when the difference between the rich and the poor becomes too skewed. The poor become, not angry, not insubordinate, but Desperate. Desperate enough to break, to steal, to cause great harm in order to find something to pawn.

Providing for the poor--keeping people housed, fed, educated, and healthy--benefits everyone in very direct ways. It is not philanthropy to provide Medicaid and unemployment benefits--it is national and personal security. But these projects do require money in order to function. Wealthy individuals and corporations should Gleefully allow their Bush tax cuts to expire, happily pay an extra million or so per annum, because it means they can lay off a few of their security guards, and maybe even defuse the land mines in the croquet field. Perhaps go outside when the weather is fair, and open the windows in the armoured car.

Because fed, sheltered, safe, and educated people don't break into houses. They're comfortable enough in their lives to not need to, and they're smart enough to recognize that they have something to lose if they get caught. If your life has value to you, you protect it. You don't improve the value of your own life by devaluing others'--you just make them more likely to try and take yours off you.

These same gun-waving "Christians," these same people who continue to insist the President's birth certificate is fraudulent and support senators who refuse homosexuals the right to love while leading the most pathetic lives of (white) adultery, money laundering, and graft need to just come clean about what they are. They're bigots. Bigots who do what their politically-bankrolled preachers tell them to do in their neon-lit mega-churches. Bigoted idiots who have been lied to time and again--and been present, but not paying attention, when those lies have been exposed--by mouthpieces which avow that social and fiscal conservatism are not only linked, but appropriate for all.

----

Homosexual marriage does not harm, undermine, de-value, or threaten heterosexual marriage. It only increases the number of marriages per year.

The function of marriage is not to make babies. People's reproductive systems can do that regardless of marital status, and married people are not legally obligated to have kids. Neither are unmarried people forbidden. That would require quite invasive government, and would get real ugly, real fast.

The function of marriage is, however, to ensure shared financial responsibility, and the right to make choices for your spouse in the event of his or her incapacitation.

Guess what--that's not even me being uber-liberal and progressive and minimalist. Read any novel written before 1900--over and over the story is "wealthy woman marries wealthy man, her estate passes to him, he squanders it and abuses her, she runs away a pauper, without claim to home or stock, she falls in love with a poor man, her wicked husband dies, she and poor man take the house back." (Okay, well that's essentially the story of the Woman in White, and bears resemblance to Jane Eyre and Pride & Prejudice) Marriage is nothing, and Never Has Been anything, but a financial arrangement.

Or an immigration issue.

You can love without marriage, and marry without love. You can equally replace both words 'love' and 'marriage' with 'sex' and be equally right. It is pretty much indistinguishable from any corporate merger, except somewhat less binding.

It is not, by any stretch of the imagination, holy.

Marriages are worth exactly the paper they're written on. Nothing more, nothing less. They have no intrinsic worth, no spiritual elevation, no super-duper special Us-Only-Because-We're-Chosen properties that can possibly be undermined by opening them up to homosexuals. Fundies like to say that marriage is a super-sacred covenant between the couple and their deity, but it doesn't upset them that Hindus, Taoists, or Buddhists are allowed to wed. (For the purpose of clarity I will acknowledge the shared god of Islam, Judaism, Mormonism, Rastafari, and Christianity) It Does annoy them that Atheists, Wiccans, Feminists, contraceptive-users, and poor people can share their visitation rights, but they can grudgingly say "land of the free, I guess" and get back to the serious business of chewing their McBurgers. But when it comes to gay people having the ability to co-sign on a mortgage or help each other's credit scores?!

----

I'm really just writing for the sake of venting frustration. This probably doesn't make a heap of sense. I'm just sick and tired of America embarrassing me--not just the Fundies, but the government and media run by the greedy wealthy who are determined to find a way of milking money from absolutely every aspect of life. People who won't perform medical procedures on the customers they insure--not because it's hopeless, but because it's expensive. People who demand you pay a fee for the right to use your internet connection how you want to, to use the products and services you choose. People who lie about matters of significance and aren't fired or even made to apologise when they're caught. People who make the system of checks and balances necessary.

Because that's how it's designed to work--both parties take the most extreme version of their wants to the floor, and through a system of compromises, come to a liveable middle ground. Everyone is dissatisfied, but nobody is beheaded for having a beard. Nobody starts with a reasonable middle-ground, because where's the fun in that? Nobody starts with what is actually best for everyone, because you can't froth at the mouth about reasonable taxation or the notion that everyone is different and that's okay. Politicians must come to the lectern with an all-or-nothing scenario so they have somewhere to haggle from. Which wastes everyone's time and gets everyone upset. Why not just start with the idea "everyone is different, and as long as their differences don't actually cause physical, financial, or psychological damage to others, they should be allowed to live life the way they choose?" What is Wrong with that? What? what...

----

As to why I'm not going back, I have a wonderful boy and I'm happy in London. I've submitted my work visa application and hopefully will have the right to get a job around here in the new year. We're about six inches deep in snow right now, but it's a good opportunity to snuggle up and waste time blogging.

No Holds Barred

2010-12-02T07:20:00.000-05:00

Beautiful.

Thanks-Fusion

2010-11-26T11:50:00.004-05:00

This was my first Turkey day in my own home that I made myself. Well, Boy helped. A lot. But we did it ourselves, and it was exciting.

We did blend a little bit of British food in with our traditional American fare. Instead of mashed potatoes and a sweet potato casserole, for instance, we made a vegetable roast of potatoes, purple potatoes (nom, and colourful!) parsnips, carrots, and butternut squash, seasoned with fresh rosemary and sage from the garden.

The result was NOM.

I made buttermilk biscuits, not really out of respect for tradition, but because I've never really understood the point or intended flavour of stuffing. They were very tasty, but did not rise very well--I've noticed this trend in my gas oven.

Boy and Boy's Brother roasted a chicken and said it was delicious. I'll take their word for it.

I also made a green bean casserole. The mushroom soup and green beans came out of tins, but I French-fried my onions myself! The result was pretty tasty, and amazingly bad for you. I baked it in a terra-cotta dish I found stashed above a cabinet that looked like it'd seen the inside of its fair share of ovens. It did a beautiful job. The recipes I found were all American, and I think they expected the soup to have more salt, so it wasn't as salty as usual, but it was certainly edible. (We ate the other half today for lunch, on toast, with a garlic and habanero sauce, and it was Wonderful.)

We bought cranberry sauce from Tesco, and it was actually much tastier than similarly-priced American sauces. But alas, no slorping sound when it fell out of the tin. (It was in a jar.)

We set up some speakers in the dining room and listened to Skynyrd for its cultural value. We sliced into my second pumpkin pie in the space of a week and it was glorious. The crust worked, and was (remains) flaky and tasty. I wrung out the fresh pumpkin in an old t-shirt instead of squeezing handfuls and it made the process much faster. (Thanks, mom!) Whipped up more maple syrup and cream. For their cultural value.

I'm still full.

Wow.

Oof.

Yellow

2010-11-23T08:56:00.002-05:00

I have painted my bathroom yellow, and will shortly be painting the study blue. I think it looks quite nice. My new drill has not yet arrived, but I do have a package for my next-door neighbours in my front hall.

I made my first pumpkin pie this past Thursday and it was wonderful. Well, I say wonderful. The fill was wonderful. The crust was just...bizarre. I used an Alton Brown crust recipe and did not like it. The edges did not burn, but became very hard and crunchy. The crust under the fill remained flexible and almost...rubbery. Not sure how I managed that. I've asked my mom to source a more idiot-proof crust recipe if she or the neighbours can think of one. The fill was really, really good though. I made it completely from scratch, from a whole pumpkin. (Didn't have much choice, actually--I couldn't find tinned stuff. But I was up for the challenge.) I gutted and steamed it (kept the seeds) then peeled and squeezed the water out by hand. I pureed it with my soup-er-izer (little spinny blade on a stick thing) and added it to single cream, a few eggs, hand-ground cloves, hand-rasped nutmeg, and some cinnamon, a bit of sugar (with a few drops of Lyle's Golden Syrup mixed in 'cos I didn't think to get brown sugar) and a pinch of salt. Baked it for 45 minutes, rotating a few times 'cos its a gas oven, and served it with cream that I whipped (with a whisk) with a generous teaspoon of maple syrup. OMG. It was light and fluffy, not overpoweringly sweet or spiced but very flavourful. I did it almost entirely by hand and all by myself.

Like I said, the crust was garbage. I think it may have been because I included some vegetable shortening when I should have just used butter. Oh Alton, why did you lead me astray?

----

Also on Thursday I officially received my MA in Advanced Theatre Practice. My post-study work visa application is all ready to go with the exception of my bank statements, which must be mailed to me because NatWest has to have them hand-engraved by Norwegian monks. I don't look at the £550 application fee as a great spending of money--it was just money I was holding in my account for this purpose. It was never mine at all.

----

This past weekend was our 1-year House-I-Versary here in Lewisham. We celebrated with some friends who moved into their house the exact same weekend we did. It was a lovely time.

----

The 25th is both Thanksgiving and Ben's and my 6th anniversary. Though of course 4 of those 6 years have been spent in wildly different time zones, we've nevertheless perservered with close affection through the modern marvel that is Skype. Thank you, Skype, for making my relationship possible, and keeping us in constant contact for years so that we might eventually find a way to be together on the ground.

Any phone company executive that would destroy net neutrality for the sake of trying to "recoup" perceived "losses" from international internet telephony is a horrible, disgusting entity that deserves nothing but inconsolable loneliness for the rest of his meaningless, pitiful life. You will not make money from making VoIP prohibitively expensive.

You will only break families.

Financial Antique

2010-11-23T08:55:00.000-05:00

I am sick to the teeth of British banks. Not that American ones are much better, but at least from US banks you can expect some semblance of modern business practices.

Let's have a look at my bank, shall we? Let's call them, oh, I dunno, DouchEast. DouchEast says they close at 5 on weekdays, but that actually means they lock the door and clear the place out by 4:15, a good two hours before most of their customers leave work. Cheque deposits, done by machine or in person, take 8-11 business days to become available to you, despite their ability to be processed instantaneously. DouchEast can rarely do anything for you in-shop--most things you request must be mailed to you, and will arrive in 7-10 days. Even if they're just documents that could be easily and securely printed off in office.

DouchEast's business practices involve a great deal of pressure--both on the employees and the customers. Employees are expected to maintain a quota of account openings per week, regardless of what their customers come in there for or the number of people in the country who need to open bank accounts. They are pushed to use every tactic available to them--up to and including flat lies--to lock customers into the ugliest, most expensive accounts and credit cards they have. When modern, skeptical customers shake off this pressure, employees are reprimanded for not meeting goals, and may eventually be fired for not being good enough salespeople. Likewise, employees are required, for PR purposes, to use their unpaid time to volunteer in the community in some capacity. Rather than be at work, where the community needs them most.

I believe DouchEast has, after helping as best they could to collapse the economy, had to make some HR cuts to maintain top-tier bonus packages. Naturally, most of these cuts have had to come from front-line plebian services, as of course the investment bankers who caused the depression are too valuable to let go. Most of their branches have desks and windows for up to 8 cashiers, but rarely have more than one person running them. Likewise, they have offices for up to ten people at a time to discuss their accounts, but typically have one person or no one available to do this. This causes queues--and fury. In banks, even a queue of five people can take an hour to slog through, as there's no telling what people are coming in to handle. It's not like checking out at the grocery store, or even getting on a roller coaster. These days queues are out the door, with fifty people or more waiting for one stressed, exhausted clerk to call them. Fifty people who have stepped out early on their lunch break because it's the only time they can be there when the bank is open, and will be delighted to discover that they won't actually have their inquiry addressed until their office closes for the day.

What makes this even more fun is the fact that their operation model sends most of their employees out of the building for lunch breaks at exactly the same time as most of their customers arrive. This is not a new problem or phenomenon--most people have jobs these days. Even back in the day when women generally did not have jobs, they had no need to go to the bank because they also weren't allowed to manage accounts. Banks have Always had to deal with most of their customers at lunch time. And they've always been short staffed at lunch time.

There are several very simple, practical, and inexpensive solutions to this problem. One is part-time shift labour. The morning shift arrives at 9 and leaves at 2; the afternoon shift arrives at noon and leaves at 5. The office is double-staffed for two hours right when most of their customers show up, everyone works a reasonable amount of time between meals, you can stagger in a few 15-minute breaks for tea, snacks, and cigarettes, and everybody gets a fair day.

Alternatively, you can have lunch-cover employees. Backstage administrative assistants most of the day, this team eats first, then comes in and takes people's places as they leave to eat in groups arranged by the size of the cover team. Once lunches have cycled through, they may go back to stapling forms and playing solitaire like normal.

Another option is to do what several companies I've worked for in New York do and call in lunch for the whole office. You buy a variety of foods, making sure to account for everyone's eating preferences and allergies--some online services even allow everyone in your office to login and, within a price cap set by the company, select a meal from up to 5 delivery places a day--and then let folks sneak off for fifteen minutes at a time to eat.

What you do not do is let most of your staff disappear for an hour the hour they are needed the most. That is stupid. And it makes people angry. Angry enough to take their money elsewhere.

Oh but wait. Everyone else behaves exactly the same way.

If it weren't for the existence of banks, no one would believe that an industry could actually survive being run so poorly. People have complained about banking services, opening hours, fees, and money-making practices since the invention of the bank. They're run badly, and they're not run with the Main Street consumer in mind. I recognize that banks are businesses and need to make money. I'm not averse to the idea that employees need to be paid. I have no real problem with bankers investing my money in rational ways for their profit, provided my money is kept safe and made available to me whenever I need it.

I Do, on the other hand, have a problem with banks being under-staffed, causing queues which waste my time and the valuable time of others. I have a problem with inefficiencies, like having to wait a week for a document I need now that can and should be printed immediately. "oh, but it's printed by our secure printing service in the middle of nowhere..." bah bah bah you could get it for me but you won't because of a policy that was established in 1870.

Everyone else has modernized. I can get free wifi on the grounds of ancient ruins. I can ride into the city in air-conditioned silence at 80 miles an hour in a train wherein, if I wanted to, I could roll a football down the aisle from the conductor's cabin to the rear fire exit. I have watched a hotel be built on its settled foundations in under a week. We have a probe ORBITING JUPITER. But you. You can't go to the printer behind you, pick up the official letterhead in the sheaf next to it, and print off six pages of bank statements for me because that's just not how you've always done things.

Banks, governments and churches. They must hold everyone else down in order to stay on top, and they have the power and money to do so.

----

In other news, I'm conviced the Mimic Octopus is far more intelligent than any human.

wind and rain

2010-11-07T08:53:00.002-05:00

Tears run freely
I blink them angrily away
Flicking my head to the side
So the wind will catch them.

If you see me
And I look like
I've just lost my puppy
Have no pity
I'm fine.

No really.
There's something wrong with my eyes.
I don't think it's allergies.
I wake up with my eyes dripping
And itchy
Every morning.

They water when I go outdoors
Blinding me
Freezing my face
Streaming like
Well, streamers

...
umm

yeah, I suck at poetry, but if anyone has any experience curing constantly watery eyes please let me know. It's driving me nuts.

orange

2010-11-01T17:02:00.002-04:00

I finished painting my dining room today. It's a lovely, rich red-orange shade. I did an okay job, I think. It's kinda shiny, which is something I've never felt ballsy enough to commit to before.

I haven't found a job yet, but I've been applying.

I still haven't heard about graduation, but I'm not particularly worried that I'll pass. I am worried that they won't get their asses in gear on the paperwork soon enough to keep me and my international classmates out of hot water with border control.

In other news, I've been keeping up with Joe My God lately, and as much as I applaud the thousands of Americans who have contributed to her first real grassroots movement in decades by making "It Gets Better" videos, they make me sad. Most of the ones I've seen (made by individuals--not the awkwardly-read ones from politicians and public figures) have told of a difficult and painful childhood that was only alleviated by leaving. The only way they could find to make their lives better was to run away from their families, their homes, everything they knew, and to go somewhere safe. Because the people who were horrible to them stayed horrible when they grew up. Their families and churches remained intolerant, even dangerous.

The videos never say "it'll get better because the world is getting better." or "when you grow up, the people you want to love you will come to accept you for who you are" or even "I had a difficult discussion with my father, but he's come to tolerate me." The sweeping majority say "When you grow up, you can leave all that shit behind. In a little while you'll never have to see those fuckers again."

And in America today, that Is the best option for gay kids in the Bible Belt. Hell, in some communities it's the best option for ethnic and religious minorities, intellectuals, feminists, and even cancer victims. Just get out. There's no rehabilitating these fascists, and if you fight for your right to pursue your own happiness, in the open, pretty soon you'll start seeing burning crosses in your front yard.

Because that's what the Tea Party is. That's who video makers have had to escape in order for things to get better. The white, Christian, middle-aged bigots who don't want to have to accept anything but themselves. Indeed, they want their identity to be the national identity, the only collective identity. I don't think they even want 'different' people to join their religion, culture, or xenophobia--they just want them to go away. They oppose diversity, tolerance, and understanding. They oppose government spending on anything that isn't a free cheque for a million dollars that only they receive for being so wonderful.

The video makers have done precisely what the Teabaggers wanted them to do. Vloggers call it escaping. Baggers call it banishment. In the end, the Baggers get what they want for their community, and the Vloggers join a new one. Nobody has to change.

Teabaggers tend to live in areas of the world where they don't have to grow to accept anyone who's different because there's no one different around. Extreme conservatism is less common in urban areas because everyone is different from everyone, so there's no opportunity for cultural insularity. It is a matter of simple proximity. Urban areas do wind up hosting gangs and working around the odd integration-proofed pocket, but this is what happens to supremacy movements in diverse communities. Weirdos who can't assimilate or tolerate others find themselves on the edges of society, angry but ultimately powerless. Most people just blend in and are fine with that. They don't try to impose upon the freedoms of their neighbours, provided their neighbours extend to them the same courtesy. Any lifestyle that doesn't actively cause harm to others is just fine.

The Tea Party are the problem. They always have been. Now at least they're a unified and easily-identifiable bag of doorknobs. A quivering mountain of human blubber sitting around in their Medicare scooters, Klan hoods in one hand, misspelt sign demanding that healthcare not be extended to poor people clutched in the other sweaty palm. These are people who hate Obama because he is black, hate homosexuals because they're told anal sex is icky, try to ruin women's lives with unwanted children as punishment for not abstaining from the most natural act in human nature, and sincerely believe that America and her people are actually better than everyone else on earth.

They are not fiscal conservatives. That's giving them too much credit for learning about and understanding conservatism. Moreover, the reductions to government involvement and financial oversight they would like to see would result in catastrophe, with each one of them out of the job as soon as their employers moved overseas, or dead in explosions when their un-inspected, corner-cut factories finally shake themselves apart.

They are not social conservatives, as they don't have any coherent moral or ethical values they're sincerely trying to uphold. They demand that women not have the option of terminating pregnancy, while simultaneously demanding that no one should have to provide health insurance to them, so these miserable women are back at work trying to pay off their hospital bills mere weeks after they give birth, making them completely unable to bond with their babies or even breastfeed them. These children grow up neglected, resented, and often abused when the stress gets too bad, leading to lives of crime, hatred, and fear. They demand that students not be permitted to learn about or accept homosexuals, and demand that the only thing their kids be taught about sex is that they shouldn't do it, and try to 'cure' them as soon as they get wind that they're gay anyway, but try and hush-up the fact that their 'homophobic' pastors are routinely caught in bed with South American rent-boys, and forgive their senators and governors for having mistresses. They ignore what it really takes to uphold family values--education, acceptance, support, and dedication--in favour of hate, fear, and disgust.

Fascism is a belief that the best way to unite a country is for the government to mandate that everyone in it believe the same thing, behave the same way, and have all the same values. Once they agree on a religion, political party, and way of life, everyone must follow it without question. The Tea Party does not believe anyone should have the right to disagree with them. They do not believe anyone should be allowed to live in America without being an evangelical Christian and adhering to their teachings. They believe the church should rule the country, just as it should dictate the specifics of every individual's entire life. Because in a unified country, there is no room for individualism, intellectualism, or dissent.

No, wait. They don't believe these things. They just mindlessly repeat these things. Because they're sheep. They're sheep who have been told by their shepherds that they're the best sheep in the whole field. If they look outside the herd they may see that that's not strictly true--all the other sheep are just as pretty as them, really--so they're told not to look. The shepherd's control over them would be compromised if the herd realized that the other sheep were happy too.

You can't be at once fiscally and socially conservative in a secular state. The two are mutually exclusive. A small government cannot execute a cultural mandate. That's why they want to empower Evangelical Christian churches to bindingly establish and enforce their way of life as The only way of life. That's their goal. Not to protect religion from a powerful state that they believe would ban it, but to empower it further than it already is compared to the rest of the first world. It is frightening, disgusting, and back-assward. It is a desire fuelled not even by religion itself, but by hate, greed, and idiocy funnelled and fanned by religious and corporate leaders to further empower and fund themselves. I'm scared shitless for America right now, because too many stupid people have been organized into a singular movement that they don't and won't ever understand. They will bring painful consequences down upon themselves and the rest of the world, and all the rest of us can do is bite our fists and wait.

26

2010-10-20T16:33:00.002-04:00

I am now past the Wednesday of my 20's.

I also have a head cold that is gradually getting worse. Bleurgh.

I'm working on a couple of small shows as part of the Creative Producers Collective with the Camden Council. I'm working very hard to clear my sinuses so I can think and be productive, but so far I haven't been very successful. I commented at a production meeting this afternoon, after spending ten minutes trying to read the lips of my nearby collaborators, "it's funny how this theatre has such dampened acoustics, seeing as it's not particularly well-insulated." They all just looked at me until I realized it wasn't the space, it was me.

I've tested a few more colours on the dining room walls and we may have found one we like. Still need to give it a good stare and (brain-functional) consideration before I splash out on the whole room. It's a saturated orange-coral shade.

Anyway. That's all I can manage with my snarfly brain. I just knocked over a glass, my lip balm, and a roll of tape. My hands are like the front axle of a 1978 Chevy Silverado with 30-plus years of mountain driving on its steering column. And a cup of coffee. Damn. I need a bib.

VAT

2010-10-11T12:56:00.002-04:00

Value Added Tax. This tax increases the price of goods and services.

The Department of Redundancy Department strikes again!

Cleaned Up

2010-10-10T17:39:00.008-04:00

Today Boy and I visited his Granny's house to begin organizing a disused study. His Grandpa passed away in 2001 and left vast stores of books, articles, photos, and Stuff neatly heaped in what could be a guest bedroom at the top of the stairs. Overwhelmed but ready to part with it, Granny needed someone who knew books to have a look at it.

I came along for the ride.

While Boy indexed shelves of tomes (discussed here) I dug into the contents of drawers, unearthing a treasure trove of nifty gadgets, contraptions, and art supplies. Granny really didn't want any of it, so we made out like kings. I'm now the proud owner of:

:a well-maintained draughtsman's tool set, including compasses, dividers, and ruling pens

:a set of French curves, rulers, and scale rules

:a small, 2-inch measuring contraption made of brass and horn embossed with "J BUCK LONDON" (Any ideas?)

:A pile of cool nautical gadgets, including small wooden parallel rulers, a marlinspike, and a small, brass weather forecaster (that depends on you having a barometer)

:Folding knives and steel measuring tapes of all shapes and sizes

:Sealing wax sticks and two stamps--one the monogram "WI" in florid lettering and one of a rabbit.

:Several fillable fountain pens and ink that's still good

:Tiny steel futuristic staplers and thousands of tiny futuristic staples

:An antique ammeter

:A clip-on coat of arms for Grandpa's school--The Brentwood (Happy 42nd, Douglas!)

:Folding scissors

:A tiny silver twist-up pencil, about 3" long, engraved with rosettes and Grandpa's initials

A suction-cup listening device for recording phone conversations.

I left some things at the house though, simply because I had no real use for them, but couldn't bring myself to throw them away. These included:

:2 Walkmen with built-in microphones

:Several sliderules and sliderule-esque devices (yuck. These things make no sense and I'm convinced they make maths harder)

:Dozens more rulers and neat wooden rules with bizarre increments

:An inlayed wooden letter-opener

:Computer cassette tapes

I was able to throw away a number of items, some joyfully, such as:

:Dozens of giant, obsolete computer and audio cables

:Bizarre answering machine accessories

:dried-out adhesives, inks, and varnish

:Windows 95 (With a separate CD for Internet Explorer 4)

:Ancient batteries and an equally ancient universal charging station

:Instruction and warranty booklets for obsolete (and generally absent) electrical goods

I've learnt a fair bit about Grandpa in the past few years--it would have been cool to have met him. He was a Methodist minister and a technology writer, so the study is filled with roughly even numbers of theological and engineering texts, many of which he wrote himself. Some of Grandpa's mechanics books are still referenced by engineering students. He was a draughtsman, a sailor, a computer fanatic, and a lover of gadgets who was regularly invited to manufacturing plants all over the world to write about their systems and machines.

As you might expect, the religious texts are still fairly relevant--even the crumbling centuries-old analyses and wartime reflections on the function of the church in society continue to resonate. We came across a family Bible that is over 150 years old, with names of children neatly written in the front as it was passed through the generations, and it looks and reads pretty much exactly like a nice, presentation-grade King James you could find today.

The technology texts, however, are all about ten to thirty years out of date. Even the newest books treat the internet like it's a novel idea. All of the manufacturing systems described in the academic texts look fairly archaic and the computer studies are hilarious. Remember the difference between "Microcomputers" and "Minicomputers"? (Spell-check apparently does!) Remember when 16-colour displays were "Sleek and cutting-edge" and enough RAM to run an egg-timer was "powerful"?

Grandpa kept up-to-date on computer technology until his final days, and there were books in the stacks from the early 2000's, but even the edgiest machines and theories of the day are adorably wimpy or pointing in the opposite direction to how history unfolded. Oh Betamax. Oh car phones. Oh poor, poor laser-discs. (I find it interesting that when CDs came out they weren't sold as 'CLDs')

Boy spent the day filling a data sheet with titles, publishers, dates, and volume quality notes, and I covered myself in dust rooting through historic pointy objects. There's still plenty left to do, and I haven't even mentioned the massive hanging file, the thousands of slides that need to be digitized, and then the final decisions: What do we do with all this stuff?

We may be able to find theologians interested in the religious texts, I'd imagine we'll recycle the obsolete tech books (those not written in-house), scan the interviews and articles, and I'll take the slide projector if no one else wants it. Might come in handy in a scenic context.

Oh dear. I've been doodling with a ruling pen this whole time and my fingers are impressively ink-stained. I feel so quaint.

Better Wording for a Controversial Policy Change

2010-10-08T06:03:00.002-04:00

I am responding to recent news reported here

It is imprudent to remind readers and viewers that their hard-earned money is being taxed to support large families--that just opens the door to people saying "but families need that money to support all their children--if you take it away, the children will suffer!"

No. Put it simply. "The current system gives families on Benefits more money for every child they have. Working people don't get a raise every time they have a child--even folks with below-average incomes. Indeed, it is the children with working parents who suffer in this system." Or, to make it personal, "I don't get more money for having more kids, so why the hell should you?" Controversy obliterated.

Maybe some prudent people only decide to have another kid after they've gotten a raise, but that's entrusting a lot of responsibility in your average parent. Some people do check their finances before trying for a child or additional child to ensure that they can still live comfortably with the new addition. Some people think they've got enough, then find out they don't and have to find a second job to feed a second mouth. Point is, some industrious (and frequently religious) people have 8 or more children and work their asses off to afford them, frequently getting by, or even thriving, on far less than what they could receive from the State. For some people this is an issue of pride, but for many it's just considered normal. One parent leaves the home to earn money and the other minds the kids. Some people put their kids in day-care so they can go work (mostly to pay for the day-care, but whatever) which offers children an opportunity to socialize.

I guess...I have several points, some of which are reasonable, and some of which are not. People do what it takes to make ends meet in order to provide for their families. Most people have the number of kids they want and can afford. (for me both columns are marked 0) If big families, like anyone, temporarily fall on hard times I am okay with the government supporting them until they get on their feet--provided they're trying to stand up--and hopefully allowing them to keep their home, neighbourhood, and dignity. I think reasonable limits must be kept in place regarding duration and extent of Benefit allowances, and after a while, if it hurts the community to keep paying for big houses or expensive private schools, everyone should have to take things down a notch. I don't think big families typically have enormous houses or send their children to expensive schools though, so this is largely moot.

But when it comes to people having more kids than they give a hoot about or can reasonably supervise and raise; people having kids for the sake of getting more money (I recall one memorable exchange between two teenage girls with screaming, ignored strollers, waiting for an A train at Hoyt-Schermerhorn, "Of course I'm looking for another baby-daddy! I need that check, and that child support. By the way, you like my new nails? I got the Works. It was only fifty dollars more than usual.") I have one simple phrase to utter, one that would piss many people off to hear.

There are people out there who would love to raise all those kids.

Of course, in all social service issues the best interests of the children involved must be the first priority. I think giving money to parents to sit around and not contribute meaningfully to their society or family, thereby teaching their kids that this behaviour is acceptable, is not in the kids' best interest, but there aren't really better options available--the foster and hostel systems routinely turn kids to crime, drugs, and violence; you can't always get kids adopted young enough to not screw them up mentally; if you interfere in every failing family there probably won't be enough hopeful adoptive parents around to take care of all the kids; the list goes on. But Actively Rewarding layabouts for making more kids? That's an insult to society. That undermines every teaching of state, church, and scout troop--and as "sit back and let the government pay you to do nothing" involves much less work than effort, study, and responsibility, it is a much easier and stronger lesson to learn. Laziness and a sense of entitlement are natural, but useless, components of the human condition. If we all did that, we'd all starve. No. Cut people off at the level that most people have to live on, regardless of family size. That teaches kids, "if you want more comforts, you're gonna have to earn them."