Issendai's Superhero Training Journal

Tue, 28 Feb 2012 22:56:53 GMT

OKCupid is a pain in the butt. How am I supposed to answer this question? Screw it--this is what we have social networking for.

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Maleficent, patroness of the oppressed

Fri, 30 Dec 2011 16:43:45 GMT

My dreams just spent a morning trying to convince me that:

As a girl, Maleficent had green skin and red hair, and would sneak out of her parents' house to visit other houses and buy the things she needed to run away.
This connects her to the goddess Persephone, who had similar characteristics.
Modern girls and women worship Maleficent/Persephone as a symbol of freedom from the family home. They either identify with her, and pray to her for help in collecting what they need and escaping home, or they pray to her to visit them in the here and now, because she will "buy anything" and take away whatever is bothering them or keeping them trapped--like their children.

It was all very Golden Bough. The dream was so real, so detailed, and so insistent that I had to check that there wasn't some Disney canon in which the young Maleficent had green skin and red hair. (She does cover up and wear an inch of makeup. It's totally possible.) The weirdest part was when I woke part of the way up early on, before the dream had named the character, and thought, "Wait, which Disney character are they talking about?" Oh, but of course--Maleficent. Not, say, Fiona, who would have been a non-psycho choice for a patroness of girls who need to escape.*

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Tue, 20 Dec 2011 22:41:00 GMT

It's great that my LJ is prominent enough to attract people with a Very Serious Need to tell me why I shouldn't be doing/thinking/saying whatever it is I'm verbing at the moment, but it would be even better if I could figure out a way to make cash off the Very Seriously Needy people.

Guest Post: My sick system is my mother... and she's dying

Fri, 16 Dec 2011 15:57:04 GMT

This is a guest post by a reader who wishes to remain anonymous. She writes, "I need more feedback than the stuff I'm getting from the people around me, which is mostly uncomprehending. [....] I've read the responses of the people who follow you and I was thinking they would understand and might have some reasonable and compassionate feedback."

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Tue, 06 Dec 2011 15:47:56 GMT
Uveitis is... steroid-and-coffee breath in the morning. Fortunately, it seems to be going away. The uveitis. Not the steroid breath. I'm going to have steroid breath for the next two months, courtesy of my eyedrop-tapering plan.

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WARNING: Purina pet food has started making pets ill

Sat, 03 Dec 2011 15:27:54 GMT

My coworker John told me that his cat was seriously ill--throwing up, lethargic, refusing food, dropping weight. The previously healthy 6-year-old, 15-pound cat had lost a third of her body weight over the last few months. The vet couldn't find anything wrong with her. Blood tests were clean, and she didn't have any known illnesses. Yet she was a few days from organ failure.

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The abuser's side of the story

Sun, 25 Sep 2011 13:50:35 GMT
For several years now, I've followed blogs about narcissists and other abusers, written by victims of abuse. They're powerful tools for recovery, and powerful testimonials to the impact of emotional abusers on other people's lives. What's been missing is the abusers' perspective on the abuse. The narcissists I follow online don't write about their relationships with their children and close friends; they hardly write about their own partners, except as props in the narcissist's ongoing drama. I assumed that there was no way to get the abusers' side of the story, that abusers are smart enough to not incriminate themselves in their own blogs, and like hell would they get together with other abusers to discuss abuse.

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The one who left, the one who stayed

Sun, 28 Aug 2011 15:19:23 GMT
Two brothers are raised by a vile, abusive man. When they grow up, one brother goes as far away as he can--on acceptable grounds, of course, work or schooling or his health--and returns only for short duty visits with his father. The other brother stays in the area and becomes his father's caretaker. The brother who stays spends more time caring for his father than for his own family, and for his pains is taken for granted. His father tells him and anyone else who will listen that his son doesn't do anything right and doesn't do what he's told. Meanwhile, the brother who left gets some meager respect from his father, because during his visits, he does repairs on his father's house.

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Mon, 22 Aug 2011 16:02:58 GMT
A year and a half ago, I took up jewelrymaking. I concentrated on beads because I don't do representational, or wirework, or anything else that requires manual precision, and beads do the color coordination and basic graphic design for you.

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Sun, 03 Apr 2011 22:21:02 GMT
People suck. I hate everything. Especially you. And it's spring.

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Cognitive dissonance: Two Years in the Forbidden City

Thu, 17 Mar 2011 23:15:08 GMT
If you're looking for an amazing historical document and a study in cognitive dissonance, I recommend reading Two Years in the Forbidden City, by "Princess" Der Ling. Der Ling was the French-educated daughter of a high-ranking Manchu official, and was 18 years old when her family returned to China from abroad. The Dragon Empress took one look at the highly educated girls and said, "Gimme!" They gave. Der Ling and her sister served as ladies-in-waiting for two years. They spent almost every day with the Empress from, quite literally, the moment she awoke until the moment she went to bed. The result is an astonishing portrait of the Empress.

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The cycle of attention in this modern age

Sun, 13 Mar 2011 14:47:57 GMT

Death. Destruction. Burning houses swept away by inland waves. Two-thirds of a town gone in minutes. Someone I know from online was in a hard-hit area, and may have had only 12 minutes' warning. No one has heard from her.

Hey, Maru is safe!

How do they keep that sofa so white with a cat in the house?

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Laundry parties

Sun, 13 Mar 2011 13:36:48 GMT
Every week or two, you haul everything dirty in the house to a fluorescent-lit room filled with loud machines, and you sit on a cold, chipped plastic seat, staring at the TV, at a paperback, or at blank space for three hours (it should be one and a half, but it always takes three) until your clothes are sufficiently dryer-scented to take home.

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Sun, 27 Feb 2011 20:33:00 GMT
MaryJanesFarm has come out with the archetypal article: "Journal Your Dream Farm."

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Gold and silver letters

Sat, 12 Feb 2011 16:10:46 GMT
I did a Thing this morning, since I was up at silly o'clock and had already had all the dishwashing I could stand. Instead, I decorated the dining room:

The gold and silver letters were on sale after Christmas at Restoration Hardware, years and years ago when Restoration Hardware was still fun. It took me this long to do anything with them--but isn't it splendid? So shiny! So pretentious! There's also a gold bowl from Provincetown and my plaque of the Lion of St. Mark. Down below, an ancestral bookcase, with a tiny antique doll of a disapproving monk meditating in front of a picture of a koi pond; random silver ornament; my collection of children's books, with sheep and stack of vintage glass furniture casters*; my collection of religious books; and ancestral caned stool, with red Chinese cushion atop it to prevent the cats from doing to the ancestral stool what cats do to fragile, scratchable things.

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Adulthood is...

Sat, 12 Feb 2011 15:10:42 GMT
Adulthood is... realizing you're so flush with cash that you can really splash out and replace the toilet seat.

Calling all would-be pirates!

Sat, 12 Feb 2011 12:07:32 GMT
I've always wanted to be a pirate queen.* Who will crew with me?

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How to Be a Perfect Manager

Wed, 09 Feb 2011 04:07:24 GMT

So you're a manager, and you're doing a good job. A great job. A perfect job, actually, but so few people notice. In fact, some of your employees keep trying to make it look like some of the mistakes they make might be attributable to you, that their petty maladjustments to work life are the result of your policies. Don't let them drag you under. Here are a few tips for fighting back when your employees try to pin their mistakes on you:
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I am the Queen of Gravy.

Thu, 03 Feb 2011 03:38:53 GMT
So there were chicken, and peas, and pie crust, but no gravy. The only gravy recipe I've made is pretty awful. And all the recipes online look like, you know, cooking.

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Sat, 29 Jan 2011 17:42:30 GMT
Quick update:
The last week of my job was weird--short, hurried, and sudden. The place where I was interviewing made an offer at the interview, I accepted then and there, they had an offer letter in my inbox by the time I got into work, and I gave notice as soon as my boss returned. We negotiated my last day, I worked the rest of the short week, and that was it. Was mostly disappointed that when you work in advertising, there's no point to coming in on your last day dressed in sloppy casual. Also... well... I got a gentle reminder of what sick systems do to good people. But time should help that one.
Arisia was excellent. I avoided pushing myself and didn't get there before 2 p.m. any day except Sunday, which meant I missed a bit of the con but was rested. The belly dance was magnificent, the musical was hilarious, the swarms of new attendees were wondrous to see, the amount of pretty of all shapes, sizes, and flavors in the hallways was delicious. I sold two pieces in the art show and traded a third piece for a pendant from one of my favorite artists. (Arisia 2010: Not a jeweler! Arisia 2011: One of the artists who inspired me to become a jeweler wants to trade for a necklace! CRANK UP THE LADY GAGA, I FEEL A DANCE COMING ON.)
Portland was spectacular, clear and warm and mostly dry with that lingering dampness that permeates the city even when it hasn't rained for days. I was struck by the size of the windows--everywhere huge plate-glass windows with no panes, so you can see into and through everything. People have vast picture windows in their living rooms, overlooking the street and low enough for passersby to see in, but no one hangs curtains. In Boston, there's a traditional species of built-in shutter for exactly that situation. Everywhere you go, everything is open; and when I mentioned heating, my friend said that oh yes, it snowed in Portland a couple of years back. But now it was late January and it was heading into spring. So on top of the wonderful species of people they make there, and the wonderful individual examples I know who live there, and the amazing food and city design and everything else Portland has to offer, it has incredible weather. Rainy, yes. But rain doesn't pile up in drifts 8 feet high outside your apartment.
And then I started the new job the day after I got home. (The schedule was: work work work work, Arisia Arisia Arisia Arisia, half day to get ready then plane, Portlaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand, work work work work.) It's been a long time since I noticed how fast time flies when you're learning something on the job, and how much better you feel at the end of the day when you've done something tangible. Having a sense of my workload and being able to chart progress is also a revolution. At the old job, it was like emptying a sink with a spoon, except the faucet knob was in the other room and a dozen different people were tugging at it. You just bailed until the sink was dry, then you tried to look like you were doing essential sink maintenance until the water started running again. At this job, I know what's on my plate and when it's due. It's... weird. I have to recalibrate everything I've been using to deal with the workday.
...And I already have a sexy new work laptop, with a Blackberry on the way.
Spend three weeks running all over Creation, hanging out with cool people and stuffing good food into your face in a continuous stream, lose five pounds. What in hell, metabolism.

On getting an agent; or, JESUS CHRIST STOP MAKING THE SAME GODDAMNED MISTAKES ALREADY

Wed, 29 Dec 2010 19:40:18 GMT
Every time I descend into the depths to see what my fellow unpublished authors are up to, I facepalm.

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Mon, 27 Dec 2010 16:48:30 GMT
On this coldest and snowiest night of the year, I was chased out of my own bedroom because it was too damn hot. The living-room window is open to let a cold breeze in, and it's STILL too hot if I stray too far from the breeze. All hail good landlords.

Thoughts on FFXII

Mon, 27 Dec 2010 15:45:02 GMT
Final Fantasy XII is Star Wars. It's a Star Wars in which Darth Vader is Byronic and well-intentioned, Leia escaped the Imperials by faking her own suicide, and Luke is allowed to tag along only because he had an older, kinder, wiser, more moral, and now deader older brother whom everyone liked. I resisted the theory--I resisted a LOT, even when Han Solo's ship had the same bridge as the Millennium Falcon*--but then we went to Cloud City and Lando Calrissian turned us over to the Empire.

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Sick systems: On whittling yourself away

Sat, 18 Dec 2010 20:54:06 GMT
One of the questions that came up repeatedly after my first sick system post was, "Don't you have to hurt yourself as much as you hurt the other person to keep a sick system running?" The answer is: YES. You must pare yourself down small--very, very small, smaller even than you thought you could go--to live as the heart of a sick system.

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Sat, 11 Dec 2010 16:56:37 GMT
I've been thinking more about narcissistic Aspergers, and realized I'm being unfair in calling it a discrete disorder. Most of the people I know who have it don't act narcissistic all the time, and elements of the behavior spread far across the neurotypical (NT) end of the spectrum. Upon further reflection, it seems that:

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