How about a kind of update
Aug. 13th, 2018 05:11 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
drwexThings have been happening. Here's a bullet list of some of them.
- We just got back from a weekend-plus trip to Western MA, with relatives. Thing 2 is at camp and Thing 1 chose to stay home which meant not needing to board the dog. We were joined by my dad and stepmom and uncle. It was more rainy and thus plan-cancelling than I would have liked, but we saw some things, ate some things, Ingressed some things.
We stayed at an AirBnB which meant having a house to ourselves, but several downsides, not least of which were stairs WAY too steep for old people and a mattress best described as a trampoline with noisy pretensions. My back and hips are not happy. The town of Lee, MA is very tourist-oriented which means it's hard to get reservations most any place, but almost every place has much-better-than-you'd-expect food and lots more gluten-free and vegetarian options than you'd expect and isn't actually all that pricey so that's good. Tanglewood is the big draw in the area and there are lots of businesses that give the tourists other things to do while waiting for the concert. We only got to one real cidery, wanted more, punted on formal museums (would've liked to do Mass MOCA), and didn't get any real "us" time. Choosing "time with relatives who may not be around all that much longer" over "us time" is a choice. I'm not regretting it, as all the relatives are having health challenges that you see in people of their ages and some of it is worrisome.
- I'm kind of binge-watching the Marvel TV series on Netflix. Been through Daredevil S1, Jessica Jones S1, partway into DD S2 (do NOT like their take on Elektra, sorry), and Luke Cage S1. Of the three I think Luke Cage is the best. They're all ultra-violent and somewhat uncomfortable. Jessica Jones in particular gets bonus points for real lesbian characters whose problems are not "she's a lesbian" and challenge points for full-frontal depictions of functional alcoholism and rape/sexual assault. Actually, there's a lot to say about that but it'd be spoilery as hell, so maybe another time.
All of the series are recorded in ways that frustrate me: the fight/violence scenes done VERY VERY LOUD and much of the dialog in close near-whispers. Thank ghu for closed captioning or I'd miss a lot of it.
- I continue to bounce around the edges of political action. I just bought myself a shirt from T'Ruah (http://www.truah.org/) for their fundraiser that says "Resisting tyranny since Pharoah" - which is just so up my alley. Got onto their list around attending a protest at the local ICE office to mark the end of Tisha B'av, which is itself a whole other post that I'm having a hella time writing.
I also went to an Elizabeth Warren "town hall" which was a combination of pep-talk, reality talk, storytelling(*), and campaign stump speech. No hints of presidential ambition; I signed up to canvas for her, but my weekends are a mess so it's not clear when or how much I'll get to do.
- Packing to get Thing 1 to college grinds forward at glacial pace, mostly due to Pygment sitting on... err, with, Thing 1 and Making Her Do The Goddamn Work. She seems completely incapable of managing this on her own and I'm convinced that if we didn't sit on her she'd go to college with the clothes on her back and that's it. I am trying to let this play itself out - I have all the worse- and worst-case scenarios and plans mapped out in my head.
On the plus side, the College sent her an "orientation" video that was stunningly positive. It was, essentially, a Code of Conduct for incoming frosh. Respect, dignity, diversity (including gender recognition), how to be an active bystander in combating sexual assault. Really, all the "lit" things we'd want new frosh to know and embody. Such a good idea, so sad we didn't have this in my day (because dear lord did 18-year-old me need this and need it badly). Of course any Code is only as good as the people who enact it so we'll see whether they do this but it's a very positive start and makes me worry less about Thing 1 interacting with official school functions like health and housing services as a trans person.
That's a list, I guess - what's up with you these days?
(*) it's her childhood story of her dad becoming disabled and her mom, at 50+ never having worked outside the home, having to go get a job and how a minimum-wage job then was enough for them to pay the mortgage, keep the utilities on, and put food on the table. You can trace a direct line from the elements of this story to the issues Warren is passionate about and it comes across as very authentic.
- We just got back from a weekend-plus trip to Western MA, with relatives. Thing 2 is at camp and Thing 1 chose to stay home which meant not needing to board the dog. We were joined by my dad and stepmom and uncle. It was more rainy and thus plan-cancelling than I would have liked, but we saw some things, ate some things, Ingressed some things.
We stayed at an AirBnB which meant having a house to ourselves, but several downsides, not least of which were stairs WAY too steep for old people and a mattress best described as a trampoline with noisy pretensions. My back and hips are not happy. The town of Lee, MA is very tourist-oriented which means it's hard to get reservations most any place, but almost every place has much-better-than-you'd-expect food and lots more gluten-free and vegetarian options than you'd expect and isn't actually all that pricey so that's good. Tanglewood is the big draw in the area and there are lots of businesses that give the tourists other things to do while waiting for the concert. We only got to one real cidery, wanted more, punted on formal museums (would've liked to do Mass MOCA), and didn't get any real "us" time. Choosing "time with relatives who may not be around all that much longer" over "us time" is a choice. I'm not regretting it, as all the relatives are having health challenges that you see in people of their ages and some of it is worrisome.
- I'm kind of binge-watching the Marvel TV series on Netflix. Been through Daredevil S1, Jessica Jones S1, partway into DD S2 (do NOT like their take on Elektra, sorry), and Luke Cage S1. Of the three I think Luke Cage is the best. They're all ultra-violent and somewhat uncomfortable. Jessica Jones in particular gets bonus points for real lesbian characters whose problems are not "she's a lesbian" and challenge points for full-frontal depictions of functional alcoholism and rape/sexual assault. Actually, there's a lot to say about that but it'd be spoilery as hell, so maybe another time.
All of the series are recorded in ways that frustrate me: the fight/violence scenes done VERY VERY LOUD and much of the dialog in close near-whispers. Thank ghu for closed captioning or I'd miss a lot of it.
- I continue to bounce around the edges of political action. I just bought myself a shirt from T'Ruah (http://www.truah.org/) for their fundraiser that says "Resisting tyranny since Pharoah" - which is just so up my alley. Got onto their list around attending a protest at the local ICE office to mark the end of Tisha B'av, which is itself a whole other post that I'm having a hella time writing.
I also went to an Elizabeth Warren "town hall" which was a combination of pep-talk, reality talk, storytelling(*), and campaign stump speech. No hints of presidential ambition; I signed up to canvas for her, but my weekends are a mess so it's not clear when or how much I'll get to do.
- Packing to get Thing 1 to college grinds forward at glacial pace, mostly due to Pygment sitting on... err, with, Thing 1 and Making Her Do The Goddamn Work. She seems completely incapable of managing this on her own and I'm convinced that if we didn't sit on her she'd go to college with the clothes on her back and that's it. I am trying to let this play itself out - I have all the worse- and worst-case scenarios and plans mapped out in my head.
On the plus side, the College sent her an "orientation" video that was stunningly positive. It was, essentially, a Code of Conduct for incoming frosh. Respect, dignity, diversity (including gender recognition), how to be an active bystander in combating sexual assault. Really, all the "lit" things we'd want new frosh to know and embody. Such a good idea, so sad we didn't have this in my day (because dear lord did 18-year-old me need this and need it badly). Of course any Code is only as good as the people who enact it so we'll see whether they do this but it's a very positive start and makes me worry less about Thing 1 interacting with official school functions like health and housing services as a trans person.
That's a list, I guess - what's up with you these days?
(*) it's her childhood story of her dad becoming disabled and her mom, at 50+ never having worked outside the home, having to go get a job and how a minimum-wage job then was enough for them to pay the mortgage, keep the utilities on, and put food on the table. You can trace a direct line from the elements of this story to the issues Warren is passionate about and it comes across as very authentic.
no subject
Date: 2018-08-14 07:13 pm (UTC)My entire motivation here is to find out what happened between Seasons 1 and 2 of Luke Cage so I can go back to watching that. Once that's done I'm not sure I'll continue. There's a limit to how much dark gritty violence I need in my life and I have other things on my to-watch list. I understand that they want these shows to be thematically similar and somewhat interlinked, but the amount of dark-and-depressing is a little overwhelming.