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Chthoni/yaSlipping the surly bonds of earth... |
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| Jan. 26th, 2010 @ 03:05 pm Do you know this face? | |||
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Current Mood:
For a while, I've had a growing suspicion that I'm less able to recognise faces than most people. My worst moment came a few years ago when I'd met so many people for a day on various courses that I decided that I'd just admit to the next unfamiliar person who started chatting to me that I couldn't remember where I knew them from. And the next person just happened to be one of my best friends. (More made up than usual and in a place where I wasn't expecting to see her, but still very embarrassing, though thankfully she doesn't seem to hold it against me.) mehNor was I ever much into recognising actors. I'd get interested in certain characters, sure, but I couldn't look at a movie and think 'oh, that's so-and-so'. I'm more able to make those links now, though I think that's largely down to IMDB making me more aware of who's been in what. And reading books I got a strong sense of the essence of a character, and even how they might look in outline, but never their facial features. ladyofastolat raised an interesting question a while back about whether people who are good at recognising faces are more likely to think about what movie actors would play which characters. I also wonder whether people who don't have a strong sense of faces more readily adapt to whatever movie version is placed in front of them, unless it's way out of line. I can't remember how I visualised most HP characters before movie-corruption set in. Movie!Teenage!Hermione doesn't work for me (the mismatch wasn't so bad when she was younger) and Umbridge and Slughorn work on their own terms but I still remember a different image. But Movie!McGonagall is firmly embedded in my mind now, and most names conjure up movie images on first thought even for characters like Neville who didn't match my image of them at all.So, I was very interested to hear the Radio 4 programme on face blindness and its opposite. Those of you in the UK can still catch it here for the next 6 days. Raised some interesting questions on how we assume we perceive each other - and some worrying ones about the usefulness of photoID and the validity of CCTV in jury evidence. And also provided a link to some Face Recognition Tests. Doing the tests was a weird experience - looking at faces without hair made me look at other features and shapes more than I normally do. Perhaps if I practice looking like that (and finally start learning to draw) I'll get better. But when shown three faces and asked which they'd shown me before, my hasty litany of heavy eyebrows/pointed chin/round face/etc did me no good whatsoever, and I ended up having to go on instinct - which one looked familiar? And my instinct seemed to go on which face was more appealing (not entirely superficial, as where I had a feeling of recognition I did feel more affinity with that face). On that test I got 67% right - they say the average is 80%, and if you get below 65% you may have face recognition difficulties. There was another test, looking at recognition of famous people - I was rather gobsmacked to get the first one right so evidently that instinct isn't completely useless - but in the end I only managed 48% of the people with whom I felt I ought to be familiar. The norm is 85%; below 50% they reckon indicates a problem. So, significantly bad, but not absolutely dire, which seems fair enough from my experience. Sometimes getting older feels like a process of discovering more and more things I can't do. And if I've met you once or twice before, and I meet you again and don't recognise you, don't take offence, okay? | |||
| Jan. 21st, 2010 @ 11:08 pm Physics | |||
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| Just got back from a talk on experiments to find Dark Matter down a mine in Yorkshire. Had to smile to discover that the particles they're trying to detect are called WIMPs. More physics lectures should be held in art galleries. We never got wine at University seminars... Am feeling a little tipsy. | |||
| Jan. 19th, 2010 @ 02:06 am Avatar | |||
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| I finally made it to see Avatar this evening. If there was ever a movie worthy of being seen on IMAX 3D, this was it - I was more than happy to pay £9 for total immersion in a gorgeous and different world for 3 hours. Pity the plot was so utterly predictable, but I hadn't been expecting much from that anyhow. I did feel moved from time to time, but mostly from the sheer beauty of what was filling my field of vision, though to be fair perhaps I'd have been more invested in the world presented if much of my brain was flipping between Wow, that's so cool! and What the heck is that out-of-focus object in the foreground? (I conclude that for the immersive effect of 3D to work, deep focus is necessary, at least on a huge screen where the main part of the action is too big to take in without moving your focus.) I left the cinema feeling awed but rather embarrassed at the storyline. I'm not quite sure why that would be - there are plenty of cliched action or romance films out there. Perhaps it's because this one seemed to be trying to be portentous, invoking a thin spirituality to add meaning. Perhaps it's because I can enjoy stock plots of good guy vs bad guy (The Patriot comes to mind) but eco-destruction-porn makes me uncomfortable. Or perhaps having the good guys on a more close-knit planet win just seems a convenient way of displacing concern for our home-grown ecocide. But perhaps I'm being too cynical. Perhaps fear of ecocide is just part of our psyche at the moment, so of course it will bubble up in creative works. Just as we watch endless permutations of romance (or read endless permutations of non-con porn), perhaps revisiting the story of ecocide and cultural destruction is something we need to do. And, after all, it's been twenty years now since Dances With Wolves, and twenty-four since The Misson. That said, it would be interesting to see a film that explores our complicity rather than encouraging us to identify with the innocent 'others' and go skipping happily off into the sunset leaving behind creature comforts, economics and multi-million-dollar entertainments. It was visually stunning, though, especially the night scenes. | |||
| Jan. 10th, 2010 @ 02:36 am "You know, being stalked isn't really a big turn-on for girls" | |||
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Current Mood:
When Buffy met Edward... laughingOkay, so this has been around for months - but I hadn't seen it before. Commentary and FAQ by the person who made it. | |||
| Jan. 9th, 2010 @ 06:01 pm Meow | |||
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Current Mood:
Dear Cat, a little chillyThe in-or-out game (aka: How many times can I get my stupid human to open the door aka: How long will she stand at the open door waiting for me to 'make up my mind') gets old very quickly when it's below zero outside. Especially when the boiler won't work and we need to conserve all the heat we have. We don't all have long fur coats, my friend. | |||
| Jan. 7th, 2010 @ 02:02 pm Fan Fiction Personality Test | |||
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| Thank-you, bunney, for linking to this meme. Apparantly, I'm: The Mindgamer Everything is possible, nothing is ever really over. Fanfiction is a creative outlet for you. You don't intentionally write it, it just happens. You find inspiration in several fandoms, but are not obsessed with only one. You like to explore "what if" situations. What if this character had never made this very choice? What if this event had taken place sooner, never, elsewhere? What if these people had never met? You are likely to write Alternative Universes, fan seasons or sequels and just follow your (sometimes pretty strange) plot bunnies. So far, so fair enough. The 'what if...' thing is very true, I think, though I think I'm at least equally 'True Fan' - i.e. wanting to keep things canon, and having my main interest in character exploration. Actually, I think most of the time when I indulge in mindgames it's explicitly to explore characterisation. I did say that I didn't have a problem with other people reading slash and mpreg, though, so perhaps that disqualifies me from canon aspirations in this meme-setters view! The meme results also include cute little graphs showing how your results compare with the maximum and everyone else's. 1) Mind Gamer 80%, higher than 83% of 'peers' (I'm not sure what they mean by 'peers', as I didn't fill in the statistical info at the end apart from my gender. But heck, it's not as if this is so very scientific!) ( 2) The True Fan 74%, higher than 65% of peers ) Actually, I think all of this applies to me more than all of the 'Mind Gamer' description. ( 3) Barely FF 63%, higher than 70% of peers ) *nods* I've enjoyed writing OCs, but my main inspiration has been existing [minor] characters. And I've not had or developed as many original ideas as I'd like. And some fanfic trends are really a mystery to me! I totally get why people are involved with fandom though. (*pets addictive personality quirk*) I do have an orginal idea in my head at the moment, but it's rather fuzzy - no where near the intensity of interaction I've felt with existing strong characters. And it's analogous to my creativity in other areas, come to that: in work situations, for example, I do tend to be better riffing off others' ideas and gaps in provision than coming up with something totally new. ( 4) Weirdo 57%, higher than 30% of peers ) Yikes, 70% of people are more weird than I am? But fair enough: Lily/Squid was never my thing. ( 5) Slasher 49%, higher than 26% of peers ) I score 49% on slash? Shows what slash-centric circles I hang out in, then - I'm sure I'd come out nearer 10% if compared against the writers I know! (I have written slash subtext, at least, and I do have a slashy plotbunny spinning wheels in my head, but as most of you know it's not exactly my focus.) ( 6) The Immature Kid 42%, higher than 47% of peers ) Well, at least this one comes out at the bottom of the list, and under 50% both for peer comparison and absolute score. But were this in any way serious I'd be a bit piqued at idea that I'm less mature than 47% of fanfic writers! Methinks that the people who write most of the dross on ffnet a) weren't honest with either themselves or the test b) didn't understand the questions and/or c) didn't know how to click a box. I'd love to know how some of you score/would score yourselves against these categories. I'm not sure where darkfic would fit, for example - I assume somewhere between MindGamer and Slasher (at least in my corner of fandom). | |||
| Jan. 1st, 2010 @ 12:15 am 2010 | |||
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Current Mood:
Happy New Year. :) Especially to those of you who are also having quiet evenings in tonight! a little blueLike last year, I'm at home; this year I have my adoptive cat for company, who stared wide-eyed when the fireworks began but doesn't seem unduly alarmed. I had a lovely week in the country - as we wended our way north on twisty slushy roads my Mum reflected that the conditions showed she'd never want to live somewhere that remote. All I could think of is I would... ( Cut for 'where the heck is my life at' angst ) | |||
| Dec. 28th, 2009 @ 12:59 am A Yorkshire Christmas | |||
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I hope you're having a good holiday/midwinter celebration, and that those who have traveled have traveled safely. relaxedI'm loving the snow. When my parents told me they'd rented a place in the Dales for Christmas, I'd hoped we might get some scenic winter weather, but never dared hope it would be this lovely. ( Here be snospam. With a little added sheepspam. ) | |||
| Dec. 23rd, 2009 @ 02:00 am Oh, bugger. | |||
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Current Mood:
Had to grin at  somewhat obsessedkennahijja's recentish confessional about branching into a new fandom. Cause, she and many of my other friends are haring after a series that revolves around a teenage boy getting tortured - nothing unusual about that 'round here. Whereas my siren call is coming from a series of which I only became aware because [almost] everyone on my list was gleefully sporking it.( Cut for those who hate Twilight. And, come to that, for those who love it. ) So. I'm kicking myself a little (but only a little) for falling for yet another figment of someone else's imagination. But I'm also wondering (and hoping) if it's symptomatic of something else. See, apart from having the chance to visit good friends and revisit old territory, my trip to Edinburgh last week had another outcome: I forgot to take my antidepressants with me. I was a bit annoyed at myself about this, because in the past when I've missed a dose or two I've lasted about a day before getting extremely dizzy. This time I had a searing sore throat on the second day, from which Hijja gallantly rescued me armed with a handful of cough sweets. But, though I felt a little unsettled, I didn't feel dreadful, and after four days of inadvertent cold turkey I decided to continue without them as my Doctor has been nagging me to do all year. Two more days and I woke up and didn't feel groggy. Bliss. Ten days and counting... and feeling not too bad, though still fuzzy-headed about practicalities. Yes, I know it's a bloody stupid time to try it, at the darkest time of the year and shitting myself about not having enough work to pay the rent, but it's been just over five years and I've had enough. I almost cried in the rehearsal for our Christmas Concert on Saturday. Which I could have done without, really, but it was such a relief to feel. Looking back, much of this last year has been buried alive. I want to feel alive, to learn something new, to feel the wind on my face, to maybe even find some self-confidence again, to taste the intensity of life even if our extrovert society's definition of such doesn't work for me. So I will take my Twilight drugs with a wry smile, in the hope that it's a sign that the shackles are slipping from my feelings. Perhaps I'll even be able to consider finding love. And to write... I've been saying, these last years (years! what waste!) that the drugs have made it harder for me to get into the writing headspace. I won't have that excuse now. Will I remember how to dance with the muse, or will I need to learn discipline to pay her homage? (Sorry, got a bit purple there. I blame the last 120 pages of New Moon.) If you've been to the cinema lately, you may have noticed adverts for a film called 'Invictus'. Freaks me out every time I see it. From tomorrow I'll be in the Dales for a week, with very sporadic internet access. I'm hoping that will help me get my fingers back to the keyboard. And finally, whether you know the source material or just like silly pics of cats, here's some Twilight and New Moon in LOLcat form: Twilight New Moon Merry Yuletude, everyone. And thanks for all the snowflakes! | |||
| Dec. 18th, 2009 @ 02:51 am Of Volterra, Volturi and fictional wizards | |||
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Current Mood:
Finally got to see the latest Twilight movie tonight (was waiting until my flatmate had  hungryI digress. I was expecting to find the Volturi ridiculous, but I rather liked them - I might even go read that section in the book (have been trying but failing to find it online - guess whatever copy I found a year ago has been hit with a C&D). I especially liked the blond one who lurked at the corner of the screen like a figment of a Vampire!Malfoy fic. As usual when my curiosity is piqued I went straight to IMDB, but no I'd never heard of him nor any of his past roles. But was most amused to see that he's been cast in HP7/8 as... Gellert Grindelwald. Hmmm. Hmmm. :-) This might even drive me to slash. PS - And yes, I'm back online now *waves hello*, though still not caught up with everything/one. Not least because last weekend was spent in Christmassy Edinburgh catching up with friends. :) It was odd returning to Spinners' End - this was the first time I'd been (that far) North since moving here, and hence the first time I've been faced with the juxtaposition between what was and what is. And I felt that should give me something more profound or soul-soothing to reflect on and write about, but my brain has remained defiantly fuzzy and unenlightening. Guess fictional vampire squee is as insightful as I get these days. | |||
| Nov. 18th, 2009 @ 05:27 pm Living from boxes | |||
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| Thanks everyone for your replies to my last post - seems that rented house furnishing is another Anglo-Scottish difference of which I was previously unaware. That said, our landlord appears to have more of a Scottish attitude. He's living in E-town, so perhaps it's rubbed off on him! I have two rooms at the moment, one of which is piled high with boxes and the other I am sleeping in. At some point I need to a) clear out the cellar so that I can b) move some of the boxes downstairs and c) canabalise the existing bed to make one small enough to fit in my room, then d) unpack all the books... it's going to be a busy few weeks I think! Still need to sort out internet and phone - luckily there is a comfortable pub with wifi about a minutes walk from my front door. I can see myself taking up residence here for much of the next week! | |||
| Nov. 12th, 2009 @ 10:55 pm What is a furnished house? | |||
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Current Mood:
I'm moving house on Saturday (just down the road, to a very cute little house I'll be sharing with a friend). Spent all afternoon packing books and have a fair bit more to do - so of course the logical thing to do when I got tired was to relax with a pizza and a beer. Hey ho. a little boozyI went and had a look round the place last night - I'll need to acquire a bed but pretty much everything else we might want is there. Except for a complete absence of mugs and a scarcity of bowls. Mugs I don't have a problem with - flat-mate-to-be and I have more than enough between us - but I was thinking I might ask the landlord if he'd reimburse us for some bowls. I mean, I don't mind paying for a few, but I don't have a lot of money... Flatmate-to-me said she wouldn't feel comfortable asking for bowls, as in her experience furnished houses didn't come with any kitchen utensils and she was quite surprised there was so much. Personally, I expect if a house is let as furnished it would have everything (well, at least the basics) - when I let my place in Edinburgh the letting agents gave me a long list of what I should provide and it included crockery and cutlery etc. But maybe the conventions are different in Scotland? I'm pretty sure crockery was provided last time I rented in England, but that was almost 20 years ago and for large student houses (privately owned and let on a joint tenancy) so perhaps the expectations were different. Anyone out there have experience of privately rented housing in England, and the expectations thereof. I'm not querying because I want to argue a point with the landlord - I'm just surprised at my friend's assumptions... Of course, moving means being off internet for a while. Not that it'll make much difference, given my recent (in)frequency of posting, but just so you know... | |||
| Nov. 12th, 2009 @ 12:04 am This is where I spent Hallowe'en... | |||
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| ( Click here for pretty pictures ) | |||
| Nov. 9th, 2009 @ 03:48 am *yawn* | |||
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| When does night change to morning? Not quite yet, I hope. | |||
| Sep. 25th, 2009 @ 12:42 am Time - where does it go? | |||
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Current Mood:
Looks like September is going the way of August. So much for not working full time so I have more time to be creative. Instead I'm finding it hard to fit in the time for both my jobs and I feel I never stop working... oldThe last two days I've been staking out Freshers' Fairs for the charity I work for. It was rather sobering to look at the date and realise that when I started Uni and went to my Freshers' Fair, this year's Freshers weren't even born! | |||
| Sep. 3rd, 2009 @ 04:07 pm Spoilers | |||
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Current Mood:
:) amused | |||
| Aug. 31st, 2009 @ 03:19 pm Accents of Darkness | |||
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Current Mood:
Yes, I know I'm almost 2 years late on this. What else is new? thoughtfulI was vaguely aware of The Dark Is Rising film when it came out, but I heard nothing good about it so avoided it. But recently I finally got hold of the Christopher Eccleston Dr Who episodes, and on finding a reference to his role as the Rider in The Dark is Rising, and finding a copy of the DVD in my local library, decided to take the plunge. I don't really want to get into the faults of the adaptation (I've seen plenty of comment around the net, the most amusing of which is this). I found the film reasonably entertaining, and enjoyed the visuals - though if ever a film should have been shot in England by an English director, this was it. At least the Harry Potter books pastiche English stereotypes, so the Hollywood lenses aren't so problematic. The Dark Is Rising film had none of the book's soul, deeply rooted in the rich soil of English myth and landscape. But I was glad of that - it leaves my book-borne images of the story intact, and can regard the film as something separate; some of the names and some of the plot is the same, but the story is not. What I was left pondering - which, given my Lucius Malfoy obsession will come as no surprise - was the role of the Rider and how Christopher Eccleston played the character. I couldn't help thinking how much more menacing Jason Isaacs would have been in the role. Not because of the way CE looked (I thought his costume was awesome, and on playing back without sound to get a few screencaps, his expressions did the job) but because of the way he sounds. One review I saw said that the Rider was as menacing as a case of pink-eye. To me he sounds a bit flat, and I'm not sure whether that's his delivery or his accent. Traditionally, villains tend to be played with upper class accents to underline their power and reduce sympathy from the viewer (Lucius being a prime example) - I'd be curious to know how this comes across to those not from the UK. Can a villain have a northern accent? Guy of Gisborne pulls it off pretty well in the BBC's Robin Hood - though the comparison to the rather camp Sheriff works in his favour. His backstory helps too, I expect - it must be easier to play dark with passion when you're a tortured soul. Whereas the Rider is the embodiment of Darkness (according to the film - it's been so long since I've read the books that I don't remember whether he has more of a story), which is a lot harder to play convincingly. I was left wondering whether the lack of intensity in the delivery was a good thing for the character, symbolising a certain detachment while making his 'Clark Kent' persona potentially creepier because he seems so unthreatening. But for that to work, we need to believe in the menace, and I was left feeling that CE actually felt darker as Doctor Who (possibly because it's more of a shock when someone we expect to be good is harsh). ETA: An example of The Rider's other persona, in one of my favourite scenes from the film, here. On a lighter note, while searching for the Lucius clip I came across this rather amusing video. :) | |||
| Aug. 31st, 2009 @ 02:16 pm This, that and the other | |||
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| No, I didn't get lost in the Dales - just somewhat lost in my head with its anxieties about work and other obligations. I'll try to be a bit more present from here on in. A few things, in no particular order, that have caught my attention recently and not-so-recently: The volume on my work mobile phone goes up to 11. This amused me. One of my daily procrastination tools is Dilbert, and something about yesterday's tickled me more than usual. Luckily the house next door is as empty as the rooms in rest of mine, so hopefully no-one was startled by my peal of laughter. Alex Rider fans (I know there are a few of you out there ;) might be interested in this article about Horowitz's use of foreign villains. I'm looking forward to the hastily-arranged Obliviate 2009 ( ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/community.gif){kind=small} hp_uk_meetup) in 5 weeks' time. I'll be there from Saturday afternoon into Sunday, though I haven't booked return travel yet.I was outraged about the US right-wingers slagging off the NHS. If it was the French or Germans or Canadians or pretty much any other civilised country then they'd have a leg to stand on, but any country whose 'health care system' excludes millions of its citizens has no right to criticise others'. And yes, part of my distaste derives from a fear that, in that system I would be rendered unfit for purpose and outside the system - as much as I try to understand American libertarianism and individualism, it's hard to be dispassionate when its implications are so hostile to me. Still, I suppose the whole furore has focused people here on how fortunate we are to have the NHS (flaws and all) compared to some alternatives. Hopefully the Tories will remember this when they next get into power. </politics> The next chapter of Invictus is being written, but slowly. I'm working from home at the moment, and I find everything tends to get muddled up so it's actually harder to block out creative time. | |||
| May. 22nd, 2009 @ 11:11 am Walking | |||
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| I'm off to spend the long weekend walking and singing in the Dales - back on Monday or Tuesday. I'll catch up with springtime_gen responses to reviews (and a few more reviews, and a bit more reading, though that'll take a bit longer) when I get back. | |||
| May. 14th, 2009 @ 01:18 pm Invictus | |||
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| I'm back! Sorting out my internet connection took rather longer than I expected, and I've been frantically busy since then trying to catch up with all sorts of things. One of which was Invictus 18, which you can now read here. A number of lovely people have created some wonderful fanart for Invictus - see the chapter heading for links! | |||
