Click to enlarge. Busy today. Writing. That’s all you’re getting…
6
And the earth moved too?
“Same-sex ‘marriage’ is a movement driven by wealthy homosexual activists and a liberal elite determined to destroy not only the institution of marriage, but democracy as well.”
—Family Research Council president Tony Perkins, on the day the Vermont legislature voted to legalize same-sex marriage. (Quote via Slate).
Obviously said by someone who doesn’t understand the meaning of democracy.
Or the meaning of – Oh, why bother. He’s just daft.
Today I was wandering around the garden with a piece of glass from a photo frame trying to catch sunlight and redirect it. Trouble is, in the tropics, the darn sun disappears behind clouds for days at a time. Sheesh. Still, it was possible.
In the meantime, my reputation as the crazy lady on the block is spreading…
__________________________
On the comments of the last post Shaanti posted this:
Trudi Canavan and Richard Morgan discussed the need to obey the laws of physics on Radio National recently. Trudi also made a reference to Glenda in that show. The link is here.
Thanks Shaanti. Trudi and Richard are guests at Swancon next weekend. Wish I was there!
In the meantime I am still trying to meet the extended deadline for Book 2 (Stormlord Rising), which is the end of this month, and I have just received the proofs of Book 1 (The Last Stormlord) to look at as well.
Last night I spent some time going around the house with a large hand mirror, bouncing light reflections off the walls.
Sort of practical physics.
I did do a year of physics in high school. I was fourteen, couldn’t make head nor tail of it and very nearly failed. I decided it wasn’t for me, and continued with Biology instead. Now I discover that that was a bad idea; you need physics to write good fantasy. As I don’t have the knowledge, I turn to the wonderful Phill Berrie instead (doesn’t he just look like a physicist?) – or bounce light off walls and wonder if my hero and heroine can really do the same thing without a mirror and on a very large scale. Hmm.
And wonder, too, why I had that knowledgeable teacher fellow in Book One say that you couldn’t do the impossible using magic… Darn. Confounded rules of magic.
Let me play with that mirror some more.
Those of you who know me well will know that you hardly ever see me wearing lipstick. Not even on very formal occasions.
There is a reason for this. You see, I eat the stuff. I’m addicted. Put lipstick on my lips and I instantly consume it to the very last bit. Five minutes, max – and it’s all gone.
Do I do it deliberately? No, of course not. I mean, who wants to spend all that money on a tube of brand-name lipstick and then never see the benefit? I don’t consciously eat the stuff. But the proof is there – when I look in the mirror, there is none. If I want a photo of myself looking lusciously sultry with shiny red lips, I have to apply it and then look straight into the camera, saying, “Quick, quick, before it’s gone!”
No problem, said my kids. There’s lipstick around now that is lick-proof. You know, the sort those synchronised swimmers wear…
So off I went and bought some. It was a bit like applying industrial strength paint suitable for, say, a battleship (ok, wrong colour, but thick glue-like stuff that should last through a sea battle or two). Worse, it makes your lips dry out like dehydrated hardtack for naval recruits.
Never mind, the kids had warned me; you just use lipgloss over the top. Right. Know how long lipgloss stays on my lips? About 30 seconds. If I’m lucky.
Fortunately for my reputation, I applied the industrial strength lipstick at home first, and then returned to the bathroom ten minutes later to see how it was holding up.
All gone. Lips as naked as the day they were born, and a lot less cute.
My jaw dropped.
Which is when I saw what had happened to the warpaint for lips.
It was now strongly adhering to my teeth. Glenda, Queen of the Vampires, had struck again.
I had to take a cloth and apply lots of elbow grease to remove it. Now why the hell can’t it stick to my lips like that??
Which is why you will rarely see me wearing lipstick.
It’s all over the internet tonight, and doubtless it will hit the newspapers in the morning, so I can tell you now.
Noramly – that’s my husband, not me – is in the news.
The Malaysian government is submitting his name as a candidate for the post of Director General of the U.N. International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna Austria, to replace Dr ElBaradei, who is retiring.
Noramly was a Deputy Director General for over six years up to 1992.
I am enormously proud of this man – he did a great job at the Agency before, he believes wholeheartedly in U.N. objectives and ideals, and in the future of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes. He is a technical man, who believes that it is time the Agency returns to its technical roots; and that political decisions – which, when it comes to nuclear matters can be real hot potatoes – should be left up to the Board. I reckon he would do a great job, but y’know, I am probably prejudiced…
Of course, none of this may come to anything. The Board will vote in June to elect a new D.G. from the candidates put forward by governments. It is supposed to be the turn of the Asian region, although that is not necessarily the way things will turn out.
As for me, well, I always did love Vienna…
I have just finished reading Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s “Love and Other Demons”. That should be required reading for all those Malaysian students in the UK* who think they were possessed of djinns. (Alternatively, they could start studying their own religion for themselves, instead of believing the rubbish others say they ought to believe.)
A lovely, lyrical book – and a look at what can happen when people use their fear of the unknown and hysteria to make decisions, instead of reason and rationale and science.
An education is supposed to make you think.
This is a direct quote from the article in The Star* newspaper the other day:
“While there are cyber laws to nab high-tech criminals, those who practise black magic get off scott free due to a lack of legislation to bring them to book. Towards this end, a non-governmental organisation in Britain has proposed the introduction of sihir laws to nail those who cast evil spells.” … “Without sihir laws, anybody is free to practise black magic without fear of being arrested…” etc etc. (They are Malaysians, aiming for such laws in Malaysia, rather than UK, I suppose).
In other words, these maniacs want to return us to a time similar to those centuries when women (and you know what? It almost always was women!) were killed for owning a black cat, or because the man next door had a mysterious illness the doctors couldn’t cure, or the neighbour’s cow died. Salem, anyone?
This pernicious rubbish being spouted in UK is not Islam. It is superstition, and vicious at that, because there is always a victim to be villified. And the victim is the person accused, not the person who had bad luck or a sick cow or who failed their exams.
And of course, black magic was always so easy to prove. For example, in days gone by, what you did was throw a person in the local duck pond with their hands bound. If they drowned, they were innocent… I wonder what the modern equivalent is? I’m sure these clowns will think of something. The djinns apparently chat to them quite happily – in Malay, of course.
*See my post of 31st March. Or see The Star 30th March
*To be fair to The Star, I imagine that they are bringing this to the attention of the public because they are as alarmed as I am…
I go to as many sf/ conventions as I can afford, which is actually not half as many as I’d like. I do without stuff to get there.
Last year I attended my second Worldcon, this one in Denver. I had a ball. Frankly, I always do, no matter how small or how large the con is. I go with that expectation, and I have never been disappointed. The little things that could have been done better are hugely outweighed by the things that are done right.
Today I received a lovely letter from Denvention with thanks for my contribution to making the con a success by my voluntary services – and a refund! Ohmigod.
Denvention, thank you. And in the interests of making sure the money is put to a good sf/f community cause, I am looking around for the next convention I can attend and volunteer for.
And all you readers, writers and sf/f folk out there – remember you don’t want to miss out on Aussiecon in Melbourne next year.
When it comes to the apparently inexplicable, people like explanations that make sense to them. When they are failing (on any level – academically, socially, economically, spiritually or even on their level of contentment or happiness), they seek reasons – and an explanation that doesn’t blame them is obviously more palatable.
In extreme cases throughout history in many parts of the world, they blame the witch down the street and stone her to death. And they often paint their crime with a veneer of religion in order to make it seem legal and acceptable. In less horrible cases they make up stories. Marsh lights today have a scientific explanation. In the past, you blamed the Will-o’-the-Wisp trying to lure you to your death in the bog.
Nowadays, when confronted with troubles, people go to the self-help section of the bookshop and buy books titled “How to…” or “The Secret” and start believing all you have to do is think positively, and you’ll win the lottery or whatever you want. You don’t have to, well, you know, actually work to solve your problems.
Students – especially those from a background of a loving, close-knit extended family with strong cultural and religious taboos and mores – are especially vulnerable when they are sent off to university in another part of the world. They not only have to accept an academia where they are not spoon-fed as they were back home, but they have to cope with a freer society. They are surrounded by temptation, or by pitfalls they never had back home. Their families are not there to consult or to intervene.
Students have to manage everything from their studies and finances to clashes with their flatmates and their landlady. They are faced with foods they may not like and they have to dodge foods that are not religiously acceptable. Problems abound. They make mistakes and feel guilty, or are unable to cope.
Unfortunately, all too often someone comes along with his/her own agenda to con them. It may not be for money; it may be simply to make himself/herself feel big and important. He or she says, “It’s not your fault.” And these people make their intervention and solutions sound acceptable and unassailable by calling it religion, or they make use of religion in their “cure” to gain acceptability. They prey on the gullible.
They preach magic, call it religion, use pop psychology – and you have the beginnings of a cult or a con or an unhealthy emphasis on blaming outside causes for a personal problem.
It makes me sad. Young people who will one day be future leaders, teachers, scientists or technocrats are buying into a belief in hocus pocus. They are rejecting reason and the rational for magic and fantasy and the unseen and unprovable. They seek learning and knowledge, yet fall prey to superstition and scare tactics.
The ultimate irony – I write fantasy. But hey, folks, it’s not real.
Want to know what prompted me to say all this?
Read this: Djinn and Tonic , also titled “Evil be gone!” in The Star on line, or see the StarTwo section of yesterday’s The Star newspaper.