I fear my reach doth exceed my grasp.

Sunday - Gods and religions from around the world. Pagan gods and religions of old and monotheistic gods and religions too. An exploration of fait...h. How the human mind works to create something larger than itself, to explain the trials and joys of the human experience.

Monday - Manic Music Monday! Mostly songs that make me happy and want to dance, but will include any song that resonates with me. To include release date, artist when I first heard it and original release and artist if it's a cover of an older song, how old I was at the time it was released, why I liked it then and if it still means the same to me now. Some songs I liked in the past I can't stand to listen to now, they remind me of harder times and emotions. This will cover many genres of music. There was a short period of anger in my life when I listened to a lot of rap music.

Tuesday - The wonders and terrors of nature. May include the beautiful as well as the destructive. I've always had a fascination with natural disasters, reminders of that we are not truly in control of our earthly home. Volcanic eruptions, floods, landslides, hurricanes, tornadoes, and especially blizzards. But there will be beautiful and awe inspiring things too!

Wednesday - Science! Covering anything and everything that strikes my fancy, the science of the human mind and body in all aspects, earth science, all that technology and physics stuff that fascinates me but I don't understand.

Thursday - History! From the beginnings of human existence to what happened last week. The good and the bad, progressive and destructive, what worked and what didn't. Civilizations that died out, civilizations that still exist and even thrive today. MIGHT include political science but I'd have to get my sons to help me with that. That is something I really don't understand and kind of don't want to but it's still important.

Friday - Movies! Movies from around the world, big budget and independent. If I could afford it I'd see a movie every Friday. Movies, movies, movies, I love the theater experience, but will include any movie I've seen, liked, disliked, thought I wouldn't like but did, thought I'd love but didn't (Alexander the Great, released in 2004. Gad. The awful awfulness.). Release date, actors, directors if they're ones I like in particular (I LIKE M. Night Shyamalan. You don't? Bite me.), if it's a remake, is it a better remake. Like that.

Saturday - Books, books, and more books. Any genre. Title, subject, date of publication, author, why I liked it, why I didn't. Did it make me think? Did I like it more or less over time? Did it make me want to throw it across the room in complete disgust? Did I read more of that author?

Good vs. Evil

Supernatural and suspense television series I have loved! I was going to make this just two blog posts, one for the short-lived series (one or two seasons, or a third incomplete season) and one for the longer running seasons (three or more complete seasons).



This is not from the show. It is, however, hilarious.
Interesting how Jesus hasn't won yet, hm?

That immediately became overwhelming. Like, before I even opened Word to get started. So I’ll start with one and we’ll so how it goes, maybe more later. I’ll begin with the show Good vs. Evil, the one that started me thinking about this. I don’t know why I thought about this show this morning, one of those thoughts that come out of nowhere. “Hm, I wish that show hadn’t been cancelled. I really liked it. How long ago was that?” And then another show and another…like that.

 

Upon searching for pictures and links for this first show I found another blogger who’d had the same idea, only he remembered far more shows than I did.  Thank you, Diacanu of Shmegalamonga. He includes superhero shows too and included shows whether he likes them or not. I’m only doing my own favorites. He didn’t appear to like G vs E, but he had a good picture and that’s what I needed.

Also, his writing is more entertaining than mine. Check him out!

G vs E (original title, later titled Good vs Evil)

I prefer to quote the opening narration for description, rather than use the IMDB or Wikipedia synopses. Or write my own synopsis, as my memory on the show is patchy. In fact, the one episode I thought I remembered was actually from a similar show on a different network, Brimstone.

Mostly I just remember I liked it and was disappointed when it was cancelled. And so…

“(Deacon Jones): A man torn from his family, murdered in his prime, only to return to Earth, resurrected as an agent of the Almighty Corps. With no magic, no special powers, forbidden from intimate contact, unrecognizable to those from their past lives, Chandler Smythe and Henry McNeil now fight to save lost souls against the minions of darkness. It is a battle of Good versus Evil. G vs E, that's what it is!”-copied and pasted from the IMDB page for G vs E.

Many of the episodes titles have the word “evil” in them. I really like the minor character of Ford Plasko, Chandler and Henry’s supervisor. Ford was played by Marshall Bell, a most excellent character actor.

This.

 

It ran for two seasons, 1999 on the USA Network and 2000 on the Sci Fi Channel (now the SyFy Channel…because…what, they wanted to appeal to 13 year old girls? Who knows.)

Its genre is sometimes listed as sci fi, action, comedy, drama (really?)…I consider it firmly in the supernatural and suspense genre. Because I say so. It’s has dark comedy, there was some action and maybe some comedic drama…really I don’t think sci fi truly fits.

It was…a sort of extremely tame precursor to Supernatural. And if you haven’t heard of Supernatural, I must ask if you’ve been living under a rock.

Now get out there and kick evil’s ass!

 

 

G vs E on IMDB
Good vs. Evil on TV.com
G vs E on Wikipedia

 

 

DO NOT USE THIS BLOG POST AS SOURCE MATERIAL!

Notable people from Alaska! I don’t know why I just spent four hours breaking down this information. I don’t remember what sparked the desire to look up famous people from Alaska this morning.

The list is not comprehensive. I used a pre-existing Wikipedia article; I did not use Google. Except to find the Wikipedia article, which was last modified on 12/10/13. I did not chase back up sources for any of the people or what they did that was notable or when they died. If they have died and are not immortal or something. Alaska. Who knows what really goes on up there?

If you are doing some sort of paper about notable Alaskan people DO NOT USE THIS BLOG POST AS SOURCE MATERIAL! Would anyone ever be stupid enough to do that? You never know.

The criteria used for including people in the article is quoted as, “individuals who were born in Alaska, grew up there, retired there, or in any other fashion lived there even if for only a brief period of time (such as infancy, during one or more of the many gold rushes during the late 19th century and early 20th century, or as a result of rapid military influx and out flux from 1940 onward).”

All numbers are approximate. They may not add up because math. I was making notes on the backs of envelopes. Occasionally I lost track of whether or not I had marked someone down. I don’t want to have to type ‘approx.’ it for every single stat so I’ll say it once more here: ALL NUMBERS ARE APPROXIMATE.

Many of the individuals were noted for a several things but in different categories, e.g., politics and writing. I did look them up if I wasn’t sure in which category I wanted to put them.

The article listed people from the 1800s to the present. There’s nothing before the 1800s because there were few non-native peoples lived there in the 1700s. Lots and lots of native peoples lived there, but they had more interesting things to do then record the native version of “Washington slept here.”

Notable people of Alaska: 133 men, 53 women

 

Artists: A broad category. I lumped in all the things people consider the traditional arts both visual and dramatic as well as such creative things such as writers and journalists, a printmaker, and a video game designer.
Living	Died 2000-2013	Died 1900-1999	Died 1800-1899
56: Jewel Kilcher-singer Robin Hobb-fantasy fiction writer	7	14	0

 

Science and Education: Includes the regular science-y stuff and also historians, an ethnographer, and the last speaker of the last speaker of the Eyak language ‘cause I figured language is culture and relates to anthropology.
Living	Died 2000-2013	Died 1900-1999	Died 1800-1899
8: William Oefelein -astronaut	3 Marie Smith Jones –Last speaker of Eyak Language	3	0

 

Sports: Includes well-known sports as well as dog sled racers and mixed martial artists.
Living	Died 2000-2013	Died 1900-1999	Died 1800-1899
42	2	5 Leonhard_Seppala: sled dog racer, key musher in the 1925 serum run to Nome	0

 

Politics and Law: Politicians, activists, lawmen, lawyers, and one female former United States CIA Operations Officer (pretty much a spy-but she’s on our side).
Living	Died 2000-2013	Died 1900-1999	Died 1800-1899
9: Valerie Plame: Spy! Sarah Palin	4	5 Wyatt Earp: Lawman	0

 

Crime: I’m sure Alaska has its share of common criminals, these are just the best known.
Living:	Died 2000-2013	Died 1900-1999	Died 1800-1899
0	0	1 Robert Stroud: convicted killer, later better known as "The Birdman of Alcatraz"	1 Soapy Smith: Con Artist and gangster
Military:
Living:	Died 2000-2013	Died 1900-1999	Died 1800-1899
0	1	4	0

 

Business:
Living:	Died 2000-2013	Died 1900-1999	Died 1800-1899
0	1	1	0

 

Adventurers: Explorers and aviation pioneers. I put the aviation guys here instead of science because I felt like it.
Living:	Died 2000-2013	Died 1900-1999	Died 1800-1899
0	0	11	1

 

WTF: Dood, you should not be famous. Unsurprisingly, they’re all still living in 2013. Being famous for…being famous is a relatively new phenomenon.
Living:	Died 2000-2013	Died 1900-1999	Died 1800-1899
4 Levi Johnston: former partner of Bristol Palin	0	0	0

 

I’ve now spent another two hours typing it all up.  I don't know why all the other tables worked fine but I can't get the crime and the military tables apart. Normally I would look up pictures to break up all the text but I have to make sloppy joes. I'm tired and have other things to do. I spent six hours on this. Why? Even I don’t know.

Move like an Englishman...it's different from walking like an Egyptian.

Cold. Oh so very, very numbingly cold. It's ten degrees, but with the wind chill it feels like one degree. One tiny Fahrenheit of warmth in the air. The earth sleeps. The trees and the green things sleep. The people shrink inside their clothes and dream dreams of warmer days. And still we all live here, in this place where it can be so very cold. We are all mad as hatters. Speaking of mercury poisoning...

I did not know Fahrenheit needs to be capitalized. And spelled with an "h". It's derived from a proper name, you see. "Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit (24 May 1686 – 16 September 1736) was a Dutch-German-Polish physicist, engineer, and glass blower who is best known for inventing the mercury-in-glass thermometer (1714)..." - Wikipedia.

There you go. You can learn something new everyday. If you are so inclined. Some Dutch-German-Polish guy is responsible for the many incidents of mercury poisoning from broken thermometers.

See...this is what I do. Make connections. One thing leads to another...

Cy Curnin, the lead singer of The Fixx, and prominently featured in the above video, moves like an Englishman. And how does an Englishman move? Well, like him. I'm not sure why it's different and distinctive from an American male moving, but it appears that way to me. What do you think?

As I was saying, before I was interrupted by my own thought. This is what I do. This is why I am Corpus Callosum. I make connections.

But back to the cold. Once upon a time some famous writer somewhere (I posted about him once but I don't feel like looking it up right now) mentioned it was poor form to begin your story with weather.

But I think, I think, I think if I started with an thorough description of the main character dealing with the mind and body numbing cold, a cold he cannot escape until his damn difficult quest is finished, that might be okay.

And I want another word for "dragons" because sometimes I think if I hear that particular word again I'll scream...

So. Dragons.

Have they been done to death? Or can the fantasy book world stand yet another book about their scaly majesty?

I have a story idea. A very complex story idea. It crawls around in my head.  It makes trouble for me when I listen to certain songs, because I'm supposed to be driving, damn it.

I long to sit and write it out complete, but would it sell? It would take a long, long time to finish, can I really afford to spend time, money, and energy on it if I will only be told yet another dragon story won't sell?

Did you ever see the movie Frida? A fabulously delicious movie about an amazing, amazing woman. This connects to my opening, I promise. Frida Kahlo, surrealist Mexican artist. In the movie Frida has a long convalescence after a terrible accident and takes up painting. When she can walk again she takes one of her paintings to the famous muralist Diego Rivera and asks him if she should continue painting, does she have any talent? Can she make any money?

Diego tells her (I'm paraphrasing, I can't remember the words exactly and I can't find a clip and dear gods, WHY do I not OWN this movie?) if she's a real painter she will paint all her life because she can't not paint. She tells him she doesn't have time to screw around painting if it won't make her any money, her family needs to, like, eat and pay bills and shit. (Again, I'm paraphrasing the movie. Frida was much more eloquent in her response.)

That's how I'm feeling about my dragons. Yeah, ya'll are driving me batshit crawling around my head making stories and demanding to be written down, but you will take all my energy and if no one wants to read the story after its finished I got whole lotta nothing with which to pay bills. I want to write you down because I'm a writer but I can't afford the huge chunk of energy it will take to create your world from whole cloth if no one want to wrap themselves in it.

Now go find Frida and watch it. There's art and sex and drinking and swearing and revolutions and death. And then there's more art and sex. It's the perfect movie and it's about an actual person.

Frida Kahlo - photo by Lucienne Bloch

I didn't really fall back a step so much as just sort of stayed where I was at the moment.

Well, I didn't call the number today.

If you are just tuning out, that statement makes no sense. Sorry. Let me back-track.

As part of the process for getting my bipolar self out of the house on a more regular basis and finding more friends in the immediate living area (more than just my one friend I know from massage school and the people who are my husband's friends I mean) I am going to join a book discussion club.

There are several options, but the most one most likely to work at getting me to leave the house is the science fiction book club.

The library website asked please call the discussion group leader before you attend. So they can sound you out I guess and make sure you're not a complete freak. I mean...if you're joining a science fiction book club, you're already a bit of a freak. That's why it's fun.

And I was going to call today. But I couldn't do it. I said it over and over again that I needed to do it. But I didn't, even though I had plenty of time.

This phone/social phobia really sucks. Calling from my cell phone while I was at work just paralyzed me. Even though I had plenty of time, my schedule was very slow today.

I need to call tomorrow. I need to. Because I really do want to go and the meeting is on Tuesday. Like, the day after tomorrow Tuesday.

The journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step. Or so I have read.

Thank the gods, Blogger has not signed me out of my account due to inactivity. I don't think I can find where I wrote down my password info and although I know I could get it sent to me it would require signing into my email. Jaysus....I can't face THAT.

So, I've had my appointment with my counselor. In a couple of weeks I'll have an appointment with the doctor and get a prescription for my meds, but right now we're operating without a med net. That sounded so much funnier in my head.

The counselor (who has an awesome name I wish I could share) helped me come up with a few ideas to start the process of self-healing. Getting back to writing here is one. Another idea is joining a book club.

There's several options there, but the most promising (meaning the one I'm most likely to actually leave the house for) is the science fiction book club at library in the next town. So.

Tomorrow I have to call the book club discussion leader. Because in the directions on the website, the library politely asked that you call the book club discussion leader if you wished to attend. And good lords, I don't want to offend my fellow SF geeks.

So tomorrow I must work up the courage to call the number listed. So I may commune with my people.