Little Tasks, Peacocks and Photoshoots

Bonjour, blogosphere!

It's summer, so naturally I seem to forget everything that I have to do and should do - like edit my story, like edit others' stories, like wake up before 11am... like, blog.

It always takes a few awkward, frustrating, and terribly boring weeks for me to get used to summer, but you know, I think I've settled. I miss my friends, I miss having class to wake up for, I miss having things to do (not homework of course! Okay, I miss homework a little. Just a LITTLE, though.)

But, I have worked out a system. I give myself a few things to do every day. In order to remain sane (or, perhaps, close to it), I give myself something "exciting" to do every day; it could vary from cleaning (really scrubbing) various poorly scrubbed corners of my apartment to weeding my bookshelves (I culled my bookshelf today by selling almost fifty books to Half Price Books. Got a whopping and heart-stopping $22.50 for them, woohoo...), to doing laundry.

(Oh, alright. I haven't done laundry in three weeks. Please don't judge me too harshly, it's on the list for tomorrow. I'm down to my "this is getting desperate" underwear in the back of my drawer, anyway.)

Things I'd really like to do in the next few weeks before I go to England mostly include some little things to spruce up my apartment; hanging curtains (this hinges on finding cheap curtains), reorganizing my clothes (which kinda-sorta hinges on finding a better way to store my clothes, though I suppose I could continue to get innovative should I have to), decorating the walls of my living room (which I'd really love to do with some of my own photographs, or some cheap, thrifty art from a thrift store, which, I've just realized, hinges on remembering to go to a thrift store.)

That all aside, I have found some productive ways to occupy my time. For instance, I finally hung up some command hooks to hang towels in my bathroom and to hang the mail key by the door (instead of it living in a pint glass on the shelf). And I totally stripped and scrubbed down my kitchen (Cinderella style: on my hands and knees. Also, little mice helped me sew a dress for a magical ball afterwards, but I had to leave early - ugh! Still waiting on the prince to call me back.) I also knitted a (small and rather scarf-like) shawl.

I knitted it with Noro sock yarn, using an entire skein. Should I ever block it, I'll show you the finished product. All you get are the pretty colors right now!

I also met with a friend Elizabeth on Monday to do a "For Fun Photo-shoot". She wanted to get some more experience and build portfolios and things - plus she has a new and super nice camera and wanted to play with it. I happily volunteered, being that I love any opportunity to look pretty (and change my facebook profile picture!)

She's a talented girl! We went to the Mayfield Park, where, to my complete shock, there were real, live peacocks just strutting around, cawing their weird, vaguely apocalyptic-sounding caws. (Being that we just so recently "survived" the Rapture, apocalyptic seemed the most appropriate adjective. But seriously - peacocks sound kind of freaky!) In any case, I instagrammed (Instagram = iPhone app that allows you to alter filters of photos) one of the peacocks while it was sitting on a bench. Because that's what I'd do if I were a peacock - chill on a bench and let my feather tail flow to the ground in all its magnificence.

Peacocks aside, the photos Elizabeth took were, indeed, facebook profile picture worthy. She sent over a few, and has promised more - I am anxiously await them! It turns out I can take a good photograph when the occasion presents itself.

It's a good thing that we ended the shoot a little early, because when I got home I was blindsided by nausea and spent the rest of the day (and most of yesterday) recovering from a stomach bug apparently making its rounds around Austin. I always seem to bounce back rather fast from these things*, so I've felt practically normal today, just like I have a stomach the size of a quarter. Anything more than a small bit of food complete filled me up today - I've had to eat like a bird all day just to make sure that I was eating at all!

The last thing I want to include in the blog, is an adorable picture of Miss Emma. I instagrammed it too, just for the heck of it!

*I don't have Barb's talent for digression, so I will digress my little tale using an asterisk! I don't often get tummy bugs (which I am so grateful for - vomiting is never high on my priority list. In fact, it's on my "to never do again" list) and what I remember of having them when I was really little was just getting to spend the day in Mom's bed with the puke bowl by my side.

There is a particular occasion, however, that springs to mind, which I will call the Great Plague of St. Gabriel's, where (when I was in seventh or eighth grade - I can't remember) enough students were struck with this vicious stomach bug that they considered closing the school for a few days just to let everyone recover. Approximately three-quarters of the student body were out with this virus over a period of two weeks - and boy, was it a sucky virus. Duncan got it before I did, but that lucky sod got to miss some school for it - I got it over the weekend and was back in school on Monday, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. So that particular story is what I base my tummy bug recovery skills on. For a more complete analysis, I suppose I'd have to ask my mom.

Judas, an Analysis

When watching Lady Gaga’s music video for her song Alejandro last summer, I was struck with the feeling that there could be a deeper meaning to the song that was brought into sharp focus by the music video. In that case, I was shocked that a video about men with Hispanic names (Alejandro, Fernando, Roberto) manifested in a music video that, for me, invoked a sense of Nazism and most certainly warlike symbolism of Western European culture.


As I often do, in order to better understand what I was seeing, I wrote a brief essay explaining what I thought.

Allow me to do this again, because the music video of Judas surprised me in a similar manner. When listening to the song alone, I expected to get the Western European themes or settings (I imagined the Holy Roman Empire, though I doubted she would do something very historically accurate), and to an extent, I also expected something with the Middle East – Israel (though that seemed far too obvious for Lady Gaga). What I did not expect was a Biker Gang and very (to perhaps over-generalize) Hispanic imagery.

Upon listening to the song, what I initially got was a sense of madness and obsession: Lady Gaga (even insane in her name, “gaga”) repeats “Judas Juda-a-a, Judas Juda-a-a, Judas Juda-a-a, Judas, GaGa” many times throughout the song. To paraphrase the Einstein quote, insanity is repetition while expecting a different result. The repetition seemed to exude an insane kind of obsession, like the more she spoke his name the more likely it was that he would come back to her.

But what is causing this obsession? Clearly it is what she has lost: Judas. She says she would do all of these things for him, if only to get him back: “I’ll wash his feet with my hair if he needs”, “Forgive him when his tongue lies through his brain”. She worships him: “A king with no crown.” Even after he betrays her, she still wants him back and would do anything for him.

But then she implies that she has been given something of a crusade, if we are to continue with the religious imagery. “I’ll bring him down, bring him down, down”. The crusade, we shall assume, is from Jesus, and to me that is reinforced by the music video (which I’ll talk about momentarily.)

A strong theme in the song is that of a dual nature. Lady Gaga exhibits a dual nature in the lines “Jesus is my virtue, Judas is the demon I cling to”, as well as “I’ve learned love is like a brick, you can build a house or sink a dead body” (which is one of those lines that reminds me of her “once you kill a cow, you gotta make a burger” line from her Telephone music video – stating the obvious, but in such a cruel, stark way that it jars). From the brick line, she launches right into a repeat of “I’ll bring him down” line, which implies to me that she will be using a brick (her love) to bring him down. Unfortunately for Gaga, she is unsuccessful. (More on that in a moment.)

And now we go to the music video, for some clarification, affirmation, and perhaps a little more depth to my argument.

In the beginning of the music video, we see the biker gang, each disciple with their name written on the back of their leather jacket.

Unlike the rest of the men, we do not see Jesus’ name; he is only identified by his crown of thorns.

The thing that struck me immediately about this scene is that Lady Gaga is in color, but the only color on the rest of the screen is red: you can see break lights, flesh tones, and the color of Judas’ bike is a very deep, blood red.

Judas spends the entire length of that portion of the music video constantly in motion toward the front of the pack, but never surpasses Jesus. The rest of the disciples remain in formation.

What the song alone did not convey to me (because the focus is entirely on Judas, and her lust after him) is that does love Jesus, even though she is still in love with Judas.

She spends most of the music video, when in the character of Mary Magdalene, touching Jesus, hanging on him, defending him with her lipstick gun.

She might still love Judas, but she has chosen to remain with Jesus.

However, something that struck me the first time I watched the video was the scene where a wave taller than Lady Gaga crashes over her, and, what with the very Christian images the video provides, my mind leapt straight to baptism.

Upon closer inspection, it is a sort of baptism, but it is entirely forced upon her. She is literally overcome and swept away by the wave. It leads me to believe that this is a forced allegiance to Jesus and to virtue, and what I realized is that although she chooses with her mind to follow Jesus, her heart remains in the darkness with Judas.

It is the second baptism of the music video that affirms this for me.

She washes the feet of Jesus and Judas,

and afterward is baptized again, this time by Judas. He pours his beer on her when her back is turned.

It is the second “beer baptism” which affirms for me that she is beyond the point where she could return (she even admits that she is “beyond repentance”) and so she is lost.

In the end of the video, she is stoned, and unlike the story of Mary Magdalene from the Bible, Jesus does not save her.

And although she dies, it is not much of a stretch to say that in this case, she does not lose. She loved Judas and never meant to leave him. If accepting her fate (death) is what she needs to do to prove herself to him, she will. Insane and obsessive, indeed.

A brief disclaimer: My intention was not to preach while writing this analysis of the song and music video. It is hard to not sound like that when the subject matter is very clearly religious, and I try to only analyze the material within its own context and emphasize the result with what I know and have learned about Christianity in my studies.

Questions for Authors

Last night, when I was at my Dad's house, we were talking about Ian McEwan (the author), who Dad used to know when he was at university. He has always expressed a feeling of regret that he lost contact with Ian after leaving school, and that someday he really should try and see him again. When he said this last night, I responded: Go for it! Also, take me with you! I'd like to ask him, "Dude. Seriously. What the fuck?"

To which Dad perplexedly asked: "What does that mean?"

It's hard to put into words exactly what that question means to me, and I am particularly fond of it in all its sharply punctuated vulgarity. I suppose it's kind of my reaction to the books I've read of his. I want to know what goes on in his head - is it a happy place? Does he enjoy making me cry? Does he enjoy screwing with his readers' brains? Does he know that I wandered around in a haze of confusion for a solid twenty-four hours after I finished The Comfort of Strangers?

I've been thinking all day about what questions I might ask to other authors (complaints, genuine questions, etc.), should I ever meet them. In the interest of the hypothetical, we're pretending like I could ask the dead ones these questions, too.

To J.K. Rowling: What about Harry's grandparents? Presumably they're all dead since Harry went to his aunt and uncle, but really - what happened to them?

To William Golding, (regarding Lord of the Flies): Did you just wake up one day and decide to finish the book? That was the most hastily cobbled-together ending I've ever read.

To John Milton: Do you honestly expect anyone to comprehend anything you write, or do you write that way so I have to read a single page five or six times on purpose?

To Garth Nix (regarding his Abhorson trilogy): What happened after Sabriel? I got so bored with the next two books that I stopped reading.

To Alison Croggon (regarding her Books of Pellinor): You do realize that Maerad is like eighteen and Cadvan is like two hundred and fifty. Right? (*I can't remember the exact ages, but the sentiment still stands.)

To Geoffry Chaucer: Why'd you have to go and DIE before you finished? COME ON. Literally, all bets were off when you never finished. Who won best story?

To J.R.R. Tolkien: Will you autograph my arm? And while you're doing that, will you tell me what happens in the fourth age of Middle Earth? Pleeeeeeeeease?

To Stephenie Meyer: I notice we share a name. How annoying does it get that nobody can spell it right? (Also, didn't you write some books or something once? How's that goin' for you?)

To Marianne Curley: What happened after the fall of the Citadel? I MUST KNOW.

To William Shakespeare: Would you mind spelling out the recipients and/or subjects of the sonnets? I'm getting sick of all this guesswork. (And while I'm asking, why did you write sixteen comedies when you could have written just one?)

To C.S. Lewis: Did you and Tolkien talk about your creation stories together? Because have you read each other's novels? They are hella similar.

To George Orwell: 1984 came and went, man, like almost three decades ago, and did you know none of that happened?

To Victoria Hanley: Can I have a hug? You seem like you give GREAT hugs. I'm sorry, I'm having a bit of a fangirl moment.

Some of these authors I'd like to ask followup questions to (or, I'll be honest, followup fangirl gushing), but I will limit myself to those for now. Perhaps I will do another one of these blogs in the future, because I've had a lot of fun thinking of these questions!

(I've linked to all of these authors, either to their websites or wikipedia pages... whichever popped up on google first!)

Oh FINALLY.

So I finished everything to do with the Spring 2011 semester yesterday. And may I say, it feels GREAT. I slept in until 1:30 today.

Yesterday, I helped Ally move out of her apartment a little more and then went home and watched a lot of Netflix. Also, I printed out a manuscript of my story, which I officially decided was FINISHED yesterday. Well, it's not finished, as it's only a draft, but it IS 96 pages of 13 completed chapters and an entire story arc and everything.

That will be a project for the next few weeks. Just give me a nice red pen and some coffee... Ahhh...

Summer. Finally.

Nominated for Best Beta

A brief blog with a single purpose, one which I believe you all must know means a lot to me.

One of my writers, a woman who writes some of the best fanfiction I've ever read and had the good fortune to edit for a good, solid two years now, has submitted my name to the "Best Beta" category for one of the Twilight fanfiction awards.

It would mean a lot to me - more than a lot actually - if you all went and took ten or fifteen seconds to vote for me.

• Go to this link: http://dft.ba/-thehobbitivy
• Type in an email address (to ensure that people don't vote more than once. However, if you have SEVERAL email addresses...)
• Scroll down to the bottom of the page to "Best Beta", select TheHobbitIvy (That's me!)
• And then submit the form.

Camilla10, the woman who nominated me, is up for several awards herself, and I feel like I would be doing her a disservice if I did not mention what she is up for as well. All voting is on the same page.

The Parachutist (Best vampire)

Heartbroken (Best Edward)

Eros and Psyche (Best Bella)

The Archer (Best story/Romance)

I've been lucky enough to edit all four of those, and I've linked them all if you want to read them. Seriously, they're more original and better-written than Twilight. (Hard not to be better-written, of course, but I'm sure you understand.)

I do not mean to sound self-righteous if I do, but I have been working for almost eight years now with very little recognition and thanks outside of the people who I do edit for, and it is really nice to see that pay off, even only in a nomination. Editing is so critical to writing, especially such informal writing and publishing as fanfiction, and it is great to see a "Best Beta" category in the contest at all. Often we are overlooked.

Voting is open until May 25th, and winners will be announced shortly afterwards. I will keep yall posted. :)