| Cyclops Got Run Over by a Head Cold |
[27 Dec 2009|07:01pm] |
Oops.
I let this slip, just a bit. ;) But I'm not gonna let 2009 pass into memory without letting it go completely, especially since I didn't post it last year, apparently. I felt like craaaap this week, and just started coming out of it the last few days. Dk's posting of it distracted me, I think. ;)
And awaaaay we go.
Here's the holiday classic "Cyclops Got Run Over by His Ex-Wife" by yours truly, ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) brucha, and dkphoenix. And CRETIN, wherever he is. Sung to the tune of "Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer" by Elmo and Patsy. Duh.
Chorus:
Cyclops got run over by his ex-wife,
Patrolling 'round the mansion Christmas Eve,
You may say there's no such thing as cloning,
But as for me and Essex, we believe.
He'd been swigging down his eggnog,
And we begged him not to go,
But Scott (that dork)'s so dedicated,
So he wobbled out the door into the snow.
When we found him Christmas morning,
At the scene of the attack,
There were claw-marks on his forehead,
And Infernal-looking symbols on his back.
Chorus:
Cyclops got run over by his ex-wife,
Patrolling 'round the mansion Christmas Eve,
You can say there's no such thing as cloning,
But as for me and Essex, we believe.
Well, we're all so proud of Cable,
He's been taking this so well,
Not a tear to rust his metal,
He just sits there playing cards with Sis Rachel.
It's not Christmas without Cyclops,
All the X-Men dressed in black,
And we just can't help but wonder,
Should we go to Sinister and clone him back?
(CLONE HIM BACK!!)
Chorus:
Cyclops got run over by his ex-wife,
Patrolling 'round the mansion Christmas Eve,
You may say there's no such thing as cloning,
But as for me and Essex, we believe.
Now that Scott is six feet under,
Jean's conscience is clear and clean,
My! Her luck is so uncanny,
At last she can go out with Wolverine.
I've warned all my friends and mutants,
Maddie could be after you,
The Goblin Queen is out for vengeance,
So glad I'm lucky to be missing from her queue.
Chorus:
Cyclops got run over by his ex-wife,
Patrolling 'round the mansion Christmas Eve,
You can say there's no such thing as cloning,
But as for me and Essex, we believe.
Sing it, Nathans!!
Chorus:
Cyclops got run over by his ex-wife,
Patrolling 'round the mansion Christmas Eve,
You may say there's no such thing as cloning,
But as for me and Essex, we believe!
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| Blast from the Past. Gene Hasenfus: December 1986 |
[27 Dec 2009|09:57pm] |
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http://rss.dailykos.com/~r/dailykos/index/~3/kmc-tq2hThA/-Blast-from-the-Past.-Gene-Hasenfus:-December-1986 Twenty-three years ago, a complete unknown sprang into the international lime-light. His name was Eugene Hasenfus. Shot down Oct. 5, 1986, while kicking crated cargo to anti-government terrorists from a CIA plane over the back-country of Nicaragua, his capture by Sandinista militiamen led to the exposure of what would become known as the Iran-contra affair. Three other crewmen died in the crash, but Hasenfus, against orders, had borrowed his skydiver brother’s parachute and, luckily for him – his name in German means "rabbit’s foot" – it opened. He landed in a jungle where he would manage to evade a Sandinista militia patrol for less than 24 hours. Upon his arrival at the Managua airport, a Sandinista soldier smiled and asked the sunburned, grime-caked Hasenfus, "What now, Rambo?" With this auspicious event began what should have been the complete unraveling of the Reagan administration.  José Fernando Canales, who shot down Hasenfus’s plane with a surface-to-air missile, leads his hapless captive through the jungle. |
When it came to Central America, that administration, with its ex-CIA Vice President and neo-conservative hatchlings making their early moves to dominate U.S. foreign policy, no deceit was spared the American people. Whether it was Guatemala, El Salvador or Nicaragua, we had your bold-faced lies, crafty lies, lies of the I-don’t-recall variety, revised memorandum lies, exaggerations, omissions, official misstatements, prevarications, phony redefinitions and historical revisions. Not to mention perjury. From false cover stories about interdicting Sandinista arms shipments to Salvadoran rebels to denials about publishing how-to terrorist manuals, the Reagan-Bush administration observed no boundaries on fictional concoction. When, for example, the original leaders of the contras, the terrorist opposition to the Sandinistas, turned out to be too rough-edged for public consumption, a new set was selected and spit-shined into "freedom fighters." They were helped in this by CIA-hired journalists in Honduras whose stories found their way back to the U.S. media, a place the CIA had been barred from putting journalists on the payroll since 1977. Various real journalists had for years been hearing hints of contra resupply missions, but they had repeatedly run into dead-ends and had been unable to find any major publications to publish their anonymously sourced, skimpily detailed stories. When queried about whether it was circumventing a congressional prohibition on aiding the contras, the White House denied, denied, denied. Ultimately, sparked by Hasenfus’s capture and an anonymously sourced article in the Lebanese magazine Ash-Shiraa, it was incontrovertibly shown that the government’s Central American policy had tendrils snaking all the way to Tehran, with huge profits from arms sales having accrued to ex-military and ex-CIA operatives. Several of the big dogs who engaged in this behavior necessitating those uncountable lies were pardoned by George H.W. Bush, who himself was a key player in the whole affair, but protected by "plausible denial." One of those pardoned, neoconservative Elliott Abrams – who had been fined $50 and put on probation for his part in Iran-contra – was appointed Deputy National Security Advisor for Global Democracy Strategy by George W. Bush in 2001. You’d expect that officials with the moral calluses necessary for such lying would also have strong stomachs. On the contrary. Faced by encounters with the truth, administration always took a powder. Whether it was the World Court judging the legality of the CIA’s mining of Nicaragua’s harbors, or President Daniel Ortega criticizing Reagan at the United Nations, the administration ducked out the door. Every time one of the revolving-door ambassadors to Central America suggested diplomacy to resolve U.S.-Nicaraguan differences, the issue was avoided by replacing him. When journalists not on the CIA payroll, such as Ray Bonner, discovered massacres by death squads whose leaders had been trained in the United States, angry phone calls were made to their editors or publishers urging that they be removed from their assignments. Hasenfus Joins Contra Resupply Effort Having learned as a Marine how to kick guns and equipment out of CIA-owned Air America planes in Southeast Asia from 1960-65, the out-of-work Hasenfus signed up in June 1986 for the same duty over Nicaragua. His boss far up the secret chain of command was Lt. Col. Oliver North, who had also seen service in Vietnam as part of the infamous assassination program, Operation Phoenix. The colonel had a boss, too. After all, he worked for the National Security Council out of the White House basement. They called the contra resupply operation "Project Democracy.'' Its planes were flown under the phantom front of Corporate Air Services, itself owned by the CIA’s Southern Air Transport based in Miami. Every flight into Nicaraguan airspace added a $750 bonus to Hasenfus’s $3000 monthly salary. He had already made 10 trips. On the 11th, however, when a teenage anti-aircraft crew fired their Soviet-made surface-to-air missile and turned the plane into scrap, they killed pilot William Cooper, co-pilot Wallace Blaine Sawyer – both U.S. citizens – and radio operator Freddy Vilches, a Nicaraguan. Hasenfus hit the silk and escaped with his life. Within a day of his capture, every executive branch niche-clinger in Washington had disavowed any link to the downed mercenary and his plane’s cargo of 60 collapsible AK-47s rifles, 50,000 AK-47 rifle cartridges, several dozen RPG-7 grenade launchers and 150 pairs of jungle boots. Secretary of State George Shultz said the aircraft "was, for all we know, a plane hired by private people, apparently some of them American. ... They had no connection with the U.S. government at all." Yep. A maverick operation. Ring up retired Major General John Singlaub, some officials told reporters, fingering the right’s leading privateer. Singlaub denied it was his plane. And soon the scheme was being reported for what it was, a CIA and NSC operation from top to bottom, flown out of Honduras and El Salvador. As would also soon become known, the operation was financed by selling weapons to Iran as part of an arms-for-hostages deal with the ayatollah’s regime. Assistant Secretary of State for Inter-American Affairs Elliott Abrams was the only member of the administration who stood up for Hasenfus, without conceding that he worked for the government. He gamely praised him as an American hero. In the months ahead, it was a label Ronald Reagan would pin on Lt. Col. North. But just as there had been no Fawn Hall on board to shred the C-123’s incriminating documents before they fell into Sandinista hands, there would be no Hasenfus doll. No Eugeneburger. No lucrative book contracts. No movie producers nosing around. No calls to run for high office. In short, none of the trappings of late 20th Century herodom.  Gene Hasenfus at his trial in November 1986. |
Instead, the Sandinistas, following the example of their Yankee tormentors, coaxed every pint of public relations juice they could from their prisoner, finding him guilty of terrorism, violation of Nicaragua's public security laws and conspiracy. The Reagan administration ridiculed the proceedings before the People's Anti-Somocista Tribunal as a judicial parody. At the time, the court had tried 243 people without a single acquittal. But no court anywhere could have found Hasenfus innocent. At the end of the trial attended by Hasenfus’s wife and brother came the first hints that he would be shown mercy. One of the nine comandantes of the Sandinista leadership, Daniel Ortega’s brother Humberto, called Hasenfus a "father" and "common citizen" who himself was a victim of the "irrational and unjust policy of the U.S. administration." Pleas for a pardon (aided by a swap for Sandinista soldiers held by the contras) were made by former U.S. Attorney General Griffin Bell and Senator Chris Dodd. On a visit to Nicaragua, Dodd told President Ortega that Hasenfus would be helpful in the congressional investigation of illegal arms sales to Iran funding illegal arms deliveries to the contras. "I think he’s got something to say. He expressed a willingness to talk to members of the staff and the members of those committees," Dodd said. "I think it would be worthwhile to get him home." So after he had served just 32 days of his 30-year sentence, the Sandinistas packed up their propaganda windfall and sent Hasenfus back to Marinette, Wisconsin, in time to enjoy Christmas with his family, a lucky fellow indeed. Hasenfus Falls on Hard Times But expenses from the trial put his house at risk to the bank. On the phone in the months after his return, you could hear the stress in his family’s voices. He’s didn’t feel so lucky those days. So he sued his ex-employers – retired Major General Richard Secord and Secord’s partner, Albert Hakim, as well as three companies, including Corporate Air Services. He sued the government and lost. So what happened? Why didn’t someone in the network of millionaire contra donors bail Hasenfus out? Could it have been because he told the truth? He had worked with two CIA agents, Hasenfus said, one of whom he knew as "Max Gomez," but who was actually Felix Rodriguez, a CIA operative who had been involved in the 1961 fiasco known as the "Bay of Pigs," wore Ché Guevara’s watch taken from the guerrilla leader’s body in Bolivia in 1967, and in 1986 had become the liaison between the contras and North. The other went by the nom de guerre of "Ramon Medina." His real name was Luis Posada Carriles, who, with Orlando Bosch, had planned the 1976 bombing of a Cubana plane carrying a fencing team to Venezuela. Seventy-three passengers and crew died. Hasenfus also told his captors that he knew more than 30 other people working for the resupply mission based at the Salvadoran Air Force Base in Ilopango. In the view of the contra resupply network, it was bad enough that Hasenfus admitted to the world that he was working for the CIA, just as he had done in Vietnam earlier. But then he admitted that he was only doing it to pay his bills, not for patriotic reasons. Most unheroic. If he had wanted sympathy from the promoters of the contra war he should have lied, just as they had done. Or, as his handlers who told him not to wear a parachute had apparently intended, he should have gone down with the plane. For telling the truth about his mission and his paltry pay, they turned their backs on him. Lt. Col. North, on the other hand, lied under oath, criminally obstructed a congressional committee, destroyed public records to foster a cover-up, and accepted money under the table. He wrapped himself tightly in the flag and emerged a heroic icon who continues nearly a quarter-century later to rake in the dough. Despite the adverse effects of the Iran-contra affair whose exposure Hasenfus helped catalyze, deceit remained alive and well on U.S. Central America policy. In October 1987, former U.N. ambassador Jeane Kirkpatrick, one of the original neoconservatives, gave a speech in Managua condemning the Sandinistas and reiterating what a high value she and the Reagan administration placed on democracy. She embraced opposition leaders, some of whom were still engaged at the time in blowing up schools and health clinics. Six years previously, she was in Argentina praising and toasting the generals of that country’s oh-so-democratic military junta. They were at the time running their "dirty war" against dissidents, dropping them from helicopters into the Atlantic and adopting out their orphaned children to families friendly to the regime. She made no call for democracy. Hugged no opposition leaders. Shortly afterward, the CIA began paying some Argentine "specialists" to train the contras in more efficient killing. And soon. Lt. Col. North and the basement junta were dipping into the treasuries of sheikhs, sultans, ayatollahs and assorted other lovers of democracy to underwrite the contra campaign of sabotage and assassination in the name of undefined Nicaraguan freedom. That murderous, unscrupulous effort didn’t quite live up to the administration’s wild fantasy of driving the Sandinistas back into the hills. But it nonetheless turned beautiful, impoverished Nicaragua into a garrison state where bullets were easier to come by than beans and the ideals of a flawed but hopeful revolution were shredded in mutual atrocities, vendettas and recrimination. Today, still suffering the after-effects of the U.S.-sponsored contra war as well as government and private corruption, Nicaragua is the second poorest country in the hemisphere, and Daniel Ortega, the fiery comandante who, with his fellow revolutionaries stormed out of the hills in 1979 to topple Anastasio Somoza Debayle’s dictatorship, is again the freely elected president, just as he was when Hasenfus came floating down in his parachute. These days, Ortega is far less fiery, except when he is pushing draconian anti-abortion laws. And Hasenfus himself? On Friday, I called the number listed for him to see if he would reminisce for a few moments. A man answered.
"Hello."
"Is this Eugene Hasenfus?"
"Yeah."
"My name is Timothy Lange, and I’m an editor at ..."
Click. Buzz. Hasenfus’s lawsuits failed and then he faded into his old life in small-town Wisconsin. On July 10, 2000, he was accused of indecent exposure in Brookfield, Wisconsin. On June 1, 2002, he killed a bear without a license and fined $260. He was accused of lascivious behavior a second time in January 2003, after exposing himself in the parking lot at Woodman's grocery store in Howard, Wisconsin, and received probation. He was accused a third time on May 25, 2005, after exposing himself in a Wal-Mart parking lot in Marinette County, Wisconsin. This violated his probation, and he was forced to serve jail time in Green Bay, Wisconsin, until December 17, 2005, the 19th anniversary of his release from a Sandinista prison. = = =
Source material was taken from my personal accounts in 1986-87, my hard-copy clip files, the Wisconsin Circuit Court Web site and here, here, here, here and here.
Final Report of the Independent Counsel for Iran/Contra Matters, widely known as the Walsh Report, named for independent Counsel, Lawrence E. Walsh.
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| Reading Kipling in the Congo |
[28 Dec 2009|02:37am] |
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http://hdtd.typepad.com/hdtd/2009/12/reading-kipling-in-the-congo.html  That was kind of strange, yes.
Every US Embassy has a lending library. Typically it's a couple of bookcases along a wall, filled with books that Embassy staff have dropped off. The rule is pretty loose: take a book, drop one off. It seems to work. The books tend towards thrillers and mysteries, with sometimes a strain of military stuff from the Marines and the defense attache. You don't find a lot of high-end literary fiction, nor a lot of nonfiction. I'm not sure whether that's because Embassy people don't read that stuff, or because they don't give it away. But anyway: I've given a lot of stuff to those libraries over the years, so I'm not shy about grabbing a book or two. In this case, a volume of short stories by Dorothy Sayers, and Life's Handicap by Kipling. So, Kipling.
Kipling was always a bit of an asshole, and he got much worse as he aged. A fair chunk of this, of course, was simply that he was an upper middle class late Victorian Englishman. But that didn't compel him to (for instance) give large sums of money to the Ulster Unionists, a bunch of bigots and religious fanatics who were actively engaged in treason against the United Kingdom. And if you're going to be a bard of Empire, it really behooves you to try to think clearly about what Empire is, and does, and who really bears the brunt of it. If you're reading his stuff while sitting in a hotel room in Lubumbashi, looking out over the utter ruin of imperialism, then it's going to have a fairly hollow ring. And yet. Kipling managed to take half a step out of himself. He couldn't ever quite see natives, negroes, Irish or Jews as real, fully rounded human beings. But he could see them as sympathetic, clever, honest and honorable, hard-working and worthy. That's a long step further than most of his generation ever got. And the son of a bitch could write. Here's the beginning of the preface, the first few paragraphs of Life's Handicap: In Northern India stood a monastery called The Chubara of Dhunni Bhagat.
No one remembered who or what Dhunni Bhagat had been. He had lived his
life, made a little money and spent it all, as every good Hindu should
do, on a work of piety—the Chubara. That was full of brick cells, gaily
painted with the figures of Gods and kings and elephants, where worn-out
priests could sit and meditate on the latter end of things; the paths
were brick paved, and the naked feet of thousands had worn them into
gutters. Clumps of mangoes sprouted from between the bricks; great pipal
trees overhung the well-windlass that whined all day; and hosts of
parrots tore through the trees. Crows and squirrels were tame in that
place, for they knew that never a priest would touch them.
The wandering mendicants, charm-sellers, and holy vagabonds for a
hundred miles round used to make the Chubara their place of call and
rest. Mahomedan, Sikh, and Hindu mixed equally under the trees. They
were old men, and when man has come to the turnstiles of Night all the
creeds in the world seem to him wonderfully alike and colourless.
Gobind the one-eyed told me this. He was a holy man who lived on an
island in the middle of a river and fed the fishes with little bread
pellets twice a day. In flood-time, when swollen corpses stranded
themselves at the foot of the island, Gobind would cause them to be
piously burned, for the sake of the honour of mankind, and having regard
to his own account with God hereafter. But when two-thirds of the island
was torn away in a spate, Gobind came across the river to Dhunni
Bhagat's Chubara, he and his brass drinking vessel with the well-cord
round the neck, his short arm-rest crutch studded with brass nails, his
roll of bedding, his big pipe, his umbrella, and his tall sugar-loaf hat
with the nodding peacock feathers in it. He wrapped himself up in his
patched quilt made of every colour and material in the world, sat down
in a sunny corner of the very quiet Chubara, and, resting his arm on his
short-handled crutch, waited for death. The people brought him food and
little clumps of marigold flowers, and he gave his blessing in return.
He was nearly blind, and his face was seamed and lined and wrinkled
beyond belief, for he had lived in his time which was before the English
came within five hundred miles of Dhunni Bhagat's Chubara. Now that is just damn good writing. Read that last paragraph again, and look at the way he varies the length and pattern of the sentences to set up a rhythm that is not quite speech but not quite prose either. Or the way that list of possessions tells us everything we need to know about Gobind, right down to that metaphorical patched quilt made of every color and material in the world. Or just consider that lovely bit about "the turnstiles of night". At one point, while reading one of the stories where he lays it on particularly thick about the selfless servants of the Queen, I paused in my reading, looked out the window, and said, "You fucker". But on the other hand, I kept reading. So, point to Kipling there. If I'd written this a week ago, it would have been all "you fucker". But well away from the Congo in a cool climate, some other things come to mind. One, Kipling got partway out of his place and time, and then got stuck. Who got all the way, and managed to cast a cold eye on their own place and era? Joseph Conrad comes to mind. Mark Twain. Nabokov, perhaps, though it's perhaps too soon to say. -- Note that this is almost irrelevant to whether the writer is good (or "great") or not. Tolstoy was very much an upper-middle-class late Imperial Russian, with pretty much exactly the prejudices and blind spots you'd expect from a man of his place, time, and class. But Tolstoy is a great writer. In fact, the kind of cool detachment I'm thinking of may be difficult for a writer of fiction to maintain. Two, Kipling joins a handful of other writers in what I call the "Hunter S. Thompson group". These are the writers who have a distinctive prose style, which looks effortless, and is very infectious. But it's actually very very hard to get right. So, hundreds of lesser writers try to copy it and fail, or are influenced by it in bad and obvious ways. Kipling was one of the first of these -- if we're talking short stories, maybe the very first -- so you can find Kipling influences across a century of English writing, from Winston Churchill to Neil Gaiman. The stronger talents can eventually metabolize Kipling and either use or reject him. Lesser writers often end up with a case of Kipling-pastiche that comes and goes for years, like a tropical fever that resists all medication. Which brings one last point: damn, they died like flies, back in the day. Almost every story in that book has somebody dropping dead of some nameless tropical disease or other. Even when the deaths themselves are for literary effect, India's lethality is presented as a simple fact. The late 19th century was, by modern standards, a pretty dangerous and unhealthy time even among the propertied middle classes. So the impact may have been blunted somewhat. Still... with a few exceptions like smoke jumpers and space shuttle crew, I doubt there's a non-military job today that's as dangerous as being an Anglo-Indian bureaucrat in the 1880s. (Random factoid: for nearly a century, the Dutch had a near-monopoly on production of quinine. Which they used to make fortunes, charging as high as the market would bear. Attempts to synthesize quinine date back to the 1850s, but the market wasn't broken open until WWII.) Kipling had a huge admiration for the middle ranks of the Imperial bureaucracy. In fact, insofar as we know of these guys today, it's thanks to him. And in some ways that's been really toxic, because there are an awful lot of unexamined assumptions underlying his stuff, and the biggest one is that the Empire was of course a great good thing, bringing peace and proper drainage to the backward corners of the world. So, the unsung struggles and premature deaths of the Empire's servants were of course heroic. Well... this goes back to what I said a couple of posts ago. Simenon had a rather different view from Kipling: he saw the Belgian bureaucrats in the Congo as pettifogging, stupid and narrow. And I'm quite sure there was a lot of truth in his descriptions. And yet... civilization needs good government, and good government needs someone to oversee accounts payable on road construction contracts and track annual production of fish meal. Anyway. No particular conclusion is reached, except that it's once again time for bed.
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| a Yuletide rec, and more forthcoming |
[27 Dec 2009|05:53pm] |
Finally I have a chance to dive into the Yuletide archive completely! Will be back with more recs.
BTW, when I did my first couple recs, I had a 13-hour drive ahead of me and was remiss in neglecting my own gift story. I offered folks a choice of Lovelace and Babbage, Empowered, Mike Hammer, and Doc Savage. And I got Lovelace and Babbage! In fact, I got Lovelace and Babbage vs. The Christmas Death Spider from Beyond the Atlantic, which is EXACTLY as awesome and perfect as that title sounds. It is -- well, here is an excerpt:
"Lovelace!" Babbage cries into the receiver. "Lovelace! Come here! I need you!"
Lovelace doesn't respond. Probably all tangled up in some nonsense with the Royal Wing, trying to make it apply to the latest developments out of Germany in Gauss' ridiculous games with -- although... He yanks himself out of mathematical reverie before he can fall off the side of the Engine. "Lovelace!" he bellows. "Now come on, algebraic consistency can wait! ... Oh, hullo."
She's standing behind and a hundred feet below him, looking up at him with an expression that could as easily be 'curiosity' or 'apathy' but is at least not one of her many and subtle variants in the 'loathing' family. "I was working on our accounts," she says.
That is sobering news, but he climbs down to better beam at her anyway. "Lady Ada von Lovelace--"
"That is not my title--"
"Lady Ada du von Countess Baron the Queen of Lovelace," Babbage continues, because what is he supposed to do, remember all her different forms of address? That would take up areas of his brain that could easily be used for brilliant calculations, "we are facing a terrible crisis."
She moves an eyebrow. That's probably 'interest' or 'nausea.' "Well, quickly, Babbage."
"It is about Christmas," Babbage says.
Lovelace's face darkens to unmistakable 'ire.'
That is to say, it is PERFECT. Babbage being Babbage, Lovelace being Lovelace, and Isambard Kingdom Brunel in ALL CAPITALS. 100% Paduaverse, gloriously done, and funny as hell. Do check it out!
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| ArtLog: new shinies - surprise! |
[27 Dec 2009|04:33pm] |
Greetings from snailsville, where the snails are wobbly but triumphant, and have definitely shifted into pendant and hair toy mode (and necklace, soon). Here are your shinies, direct from the Lioness:
( Oooh. Shiny! )
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| You should draw Art Cards! |
[27 Dec 2009|06:23pm] |
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This post is all about why I love art cards and why you should, too. First, a word from responsible work ethic: I am working on art cards -and- commissions today, and I need to color icons, too! Woo, post-holiday catchup! Thank you, responsible work ethic. OKAY ENOUGH OF THAT
Since I draw these a lot, I thought I should make a post to tell people who might not know about art cards about them! If you already draw art cards, I invite you to link to your work in this post!
Art cards come in two flavors, ATCs and ACEOs. Both of them are 2.5″x3.5″, trading card sized pieces of miniature art. The difference is in what’s done with them. ATCs were the original concept, intended for trade among artists, which is why they’re Art Trading Cards. Some people decided they wanted to sell their trading cards, and came up with a different name, to avoid stepping on the toes of the folks who trade ‘em. ACEOs are art cards that are for sale. It stands for Art Cards: Editions and Originals. Possibly, it also stands for ART CARDS: ELECTRIC OCTOPI but probably not. Some people sell print editions of their art cards, and some people sell originals.
You should collect these! Lots of artists draw them, and I bet a lot more would draw them if you threw money at them and asked them to draw on a 2.5″x3.5″ sheet of cardstock. It’s an inexpensive way to get original art, and they’re pretty easy and fun to trade for, too. You can find art cards on Ebay and Etsy, and there are online and offline groups dedicated to selling, trading and making these things. Because they’re trading card sized, there’s already a ton of protective sheets, sleeves, binders, etc. geared toward collecting them.
You should draw these! It’s addicting! It lets you put down ideas as quickly as you can come up with them, and have a finished piece to show for it. I like drawing small, and enjoy the challenge of setting up fun compositions within the limited format. You can cut your own blank cards, or buy packs of art paper already cut to the right size for dirt cheap.
Here’s a new art card group on deviantArt - http://aceo-atc.deviantart.com/
Here are some art cards I finished!
www.ninjahijinx.com
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| Christmas update |
[27 Dec 2009|05:02pm] |
It was a good Christmas. I didn't really need or want much. Got a wonderfully soft fuzzy black cowl neck sweater (I helped pick it, so no surprise), a burgundy wool turtleneck from my sister, a navy crew neck sweater from my mother-in-law and a really pretty navy damask/jacquard (?) shirt from my mother. She had shown me a shirt she'd gotten for Dad, and I said I'd love one like it. So she called the store and got them to put one on hold for her, men's medium since they didn't have any smalls. It is a bit big but looks great. Got a book from her and two books of SF short stories from Andrew. Got a 1000 piece jigsaw with a musical score on it (no idea what music). Also a really pretty scarf from my younger son. Teas (as requested) from my elder son.
We had a quiet Christmas Day. Mum, Dad and my youngest sister, Anne, arrived late evening Christmas Eve, just in time for Dad to join me and my elder son at the late church service. Dad and elder son went to pick up my mother-in-law Christmas morning, and when she arrived and tea had been poured, we distributed and opened presents. Casual lunch of soup and toast and then watched the Queen's message and A Christmas Story. Turkey dinner around 5, and relaxed after that. Andrew took his mum home.
Boxing Day, Mum, Dad, Anne and the 4 of us went to the annual pantomime in Toronto. This year it was Robin Hood. The story line was rather weak, even more so than usual, but it was a lot of fun. Came home for turkey sandwiches for dinner, yum, and then my parents and sister headed back down to Niagara on the Lake.
Today, Andrew and I went to visit friends in Guelph, who have an annual open house over the holidays. Was a fun afternoon. Nothing planned for this evening, or for the rest of the week before New Year's Eve.
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| Writer's Block: All work and no play ... |
[27 Dec 2009|04:51pm] |
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For a day or two, love to curl up with a warm blanket and a good book or some cross stitching. If not too cold or blustery, don't mind bundling up and going for a walk.
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| Midday open thread |
[27 Dec 2009|08:00pm] |
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http://rss.dailykos.com/~r/dailykos/index/~3/jYhRjQ9yAMg/-Midday-open-thread - Via Think Progress, we learn that Mary "Time Warp" Matalin thinks 9/11 happened during Bill Clinton's second term:
MATALIN: I was there, we inherited a recession from President Clinton and we inherited the most tragic attack on our own soil in our nation’s history. And President Bush dealt with it and within a year of his presidency within a comparable time, unemployment was at 5 percent. - Obama orders a review of watch lists and other airport screening procedures in the aftermath of the failed attempt to bring down a Detroit-bound Northwest plane yesterday. Here's a report on the possible Yemen connection. The BBC has a backgrounder on the Nigerian student under arrest for the failed bombing.
- In Day Two of "Republicans Politicizing Failed Explosion," Jim DeMint bashes unions and throws around accusations of "appeasement." Upping the ante, Pete Hoekstra directly blames Obama, with extra points given to Fox News for leading questions:
Asked by Fox News Sunday host Chris Wallace if it is fair to blame the Obama administration for the attacks, the Michigan Republican replied ""Yeah, I think it really is." - Joe Lieberman's got the war itch and it looks like Yemen's shaping up to be the scratch.
- You had to see this one coming -- the attempted terrorist attack on Christmas Day "could complicate" shutting down the prison at Guantanamo Bay.
- Deaths begin to mount in Iranian protests, and the New York Times is providing near-hourly updates on AP wire reports. In the past hour, the White House released the following statement on the protests:
Statement by National Security Council Spokesman Mike Hammer on violence in Iran We strongly condemn the violent and unjust suppression of civilians in Iran seeking to exercise their universal rights. Hope and history are on the side of those who peacefully seek their universal rights, and so is the United States. Governing through fear and violence is never just, and as President Obama said in Oslo - it is telling when governments fear the aspirations of their own people more than the power of any other nation. - Sherlock Holmes film breaks box office record for Christmas Day debut, while Avatar is No. 1 in the "highest grossing film weekend ever," according to Business Week.
- Watchdog groups give the Obama administration high marks for ethics during the first year in office.
- The end of an era:
Percy Sutton, the pioneering civil rights attorney who represented Malcolm X before launching successful careers as a political power broker and media mogul, has died. He was 89. - Robert Gibbs tells Jake Tapper that President Obama prefers the Senate bill's language regarding abortion funding.
- As we enter the final stretch of passing a health care reform bill, the fight continues over $50 million for abstinence only education -- even though studies (and common sense) have shown that it doesn't work.
- Ezra Klein talks to Tom Harkin about ending the filibuster.
- Tomorrow at 9 a.m., C-SPAN will begin broadcasting classes from the Campaign Management Institute at American University. Helping lead the discussions will be Assistant Director of the CMI Chris McGann, known to you as fellow Kossack and Congress Matters Contributing Editor Casual Wednesday. Tune in between 9 and 9:30 to catch him helping to kick things off, and check the C-SPAN schedules to see when you might catch some of the other interesting speakers they've lined up for classes between tomorrow and the program's conclusion on Jan. 7.
- The top 10 political tweets of the year?
Update: And apparently there's another Northwest Airline Amsterdam/Detroit incident, this one currently being reported as problems with a "disruptive passenger," according to CNN: A Northwest Airlines jet was met by police at Detroit, Michigan's airport Sunday after its flight crew reported a "verbally disruptive" passenger, airline and airport officials said. The crew of the Amsterdam, Netherlands-to-Detroit flight requested assistance two days after a man was accused of attempting to set off an explosive device aboard a jet flying the same route. Passengers were being let off the jetliner after landing, according to Susan Elliott, a spokeswoman for Delta Air Lines, which owns Northwest.
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| Asked if GOP should campaign on repealing health reform, Mitch McConnell refuses to answer. |
[27 Dec 2009|08:33pm] |
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http://thinkprogress.org/2009/12/27/mitch-repeal-health/ http://thinkprogress.org/?p=75270 Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) has marshaled his party to not only oppose health reform in the Senate, but also to obstruct the legislative process all along the way in an attempt to kill the bill. Senate Republicans have delayed legislative proceedings, politicized and filibustered the Defense appropriations bill, and have lied consistently about health reform legislation. But this morning on ABC’s This Week, McConnell was asked repeatedly if he would campaign in future elections on a platform of repealing health reform, and place repealing the legislation at the top of his agenda. McConnell refused to answer, instead saying that he would merely attack the legislation:
TAPPER: Do you think that Republicans running for Senate in 2010 should run on a platform of vowing to repeal the healthcare reform bill should it become law and will that be one of your first items should you regain control of the Senate, repealing what you guys call Obamacare?
MCCONNELL: Well certainly it’s a big problem for them. [...]
TAPPER: Respectfully sir, you didn’t answer my question which is, will Republicans campaign on a platform of repealing the health care reform measure and will that be one of the first items in your agenda should you become the new Senate Majority Leader after the 2010 elections?
MCCONNELL: Well, I’m sorry I thought I did answer your question. It’s no question that this bill, if it were to become law, and frankly even if it doesn’t become law, will be a big, if not central issue, not only in the 2010 elections, but in the 2012 elections.
TAPPER: Alright, well I’ll take that as a yes they should campaign on repealing Obamacare.
Watch it:
Later in the program, during the round table, host Jake Tapper noted that he “couldnt really get McConnell to say Republicans should campaign on repealing Obamacare.” While McConnell feels confident lying about the legislation to scare the public into voting in more Republicans, he won’t commit to repealing it. His refusal illustrates the insincerity of his attacks, including the unfounded smear that health reform “may cost you your life.”
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| Dollhouse - Meet Jane Doe |
[27 Dec 2009|04:23pm] |
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Spoiler explanation: I have not seen Stop Loss or The Attic yet, so. No spoilers there. I did watch these two episodes back-to-back like everyone else (dude, what is that like? On the teevee where you can't choose your commercial experience? I DO NOT KNOW.) ( Dollhouse - Meet Jane Doe )
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| Dollhouse - The Left Hand |
[27 Dec 2009|03:56pm] |
I started this review not having seen Jane Doe and Love Supreme yet, but since then I have seen them. I think I’ve successfully kept out all spoilers for those episodes. I have not seen Stop Loss or The Attic yet, so no spoilers at all for 9 and 10. |
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| Ah! Vacation! |
[27 Dec 2009|11:45am] |
I am way overdue for a change to the old LJ layout, and I finally have time to start geeking around with it. If you view LJs in their own styles, mine must be looking a little nekkid at the moment, because I'm still casting about for a header image of my own, and a color scheme. You know, general New Year's spiffing-up.
(I'm using this base stylesheet.)
I keep thinking I should be expending these efforts over on Dreamwidth, but my community just keeps on not being over there. Sigh...so it's LJ with all LJ's little faults, at least for now.
Hope everyone's enjoying a pleasant post-holiday Sunday. Mine could only be improved on by a slightly warmer house. Brr!
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| Exits, 2009 |
[27 Dec 2009|06:08pm] |
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http://rss.dailykos.com/~r/dailykos/index/~3/0L_CxCBy-lU/-Exits,-2009 There's a sad tradition of looking back at the end of the year to see the toll that time has taken of our friends and heroes. We may never had met some of those we most admired, may never have stood in the same place with them. But we shared time with them. Shared an era. Some of them not only shared our time, but helped to shape it, and 2009 is the last year we hold in common. So here, as last year, is an eclectic gathering of just a few of those we lost during the last twelve months. I invite you to add other names and stories to the list. When you think of baseball, Billy Werber may not be the first name that comes to your mind. For three seasons in the 1930s, he lead the league in stolen bases, but with a .271 career batting average and only 78 home runs spaced across 11 seasons, he wasn't exactly an offensive powerhouse. But if Werber wasn't that famous, he shared both time and space with someone who was. Werber was the last living teammate of Babe Ruth. He was also Ruth's last living opponent. Who was so cool that he not only turned down the chance to be The Saint, but passed on the chance to say "Bond, James Bond"? It was Secret Agent man, Patrick McGoohan. McGoohan was born in Queens, New York City, but he cemented his position as an international icon when, during the 4th season of Secret Agent (Danger Man in the UK) McGoohan created a new series which he produced, wrote, directed and starred in. More than forty years later, fans are still puzzling out all the messages of The Prisoner (and trying to avoid the remake). You may still have leftover holiday ham today, but sooner or later you'll grab another hot dog, and when you do, thank Alan Geisler for the red onion sauce he invented. Rabbit came to rest in 1990, but it took nearly two decades more before Rabbit's creator put down his pen. Multiple Pulitzer winner, John Updike, wrote about characters in crisis -- ordinary Americans caught in hard spots. He did it with prose that celebrated directness and plots that were as whimsical as Estwick, as ordinary as those surrounding Harry "Rabbit" Angstrom, and as familiar as our own lives. Mr. Rogers kept an Andrew Wyeth painting next to the door of his home, visible in every episode of his show. What higher endorsement can there be? In these days of CSI and Bones, it's easy to forget where the character of the forensic scientist appeared on American TV. But there would have been far fewer chances to say "Book'em, Danno" if Che Fong, played by actor Harry Endo had not been there with all the answers. Figure eight is double four. Figure four is half of eight. If you skate, you would be great. If you could make a figure eight. And if you sing, you would be great if you could achieve the crystal purity of singer Blossom Dearie. Dearie was a well-known jazz artist since the 1940s, but for a generation of Americans, she'll be remembered as the voice of "Mother Necessity" and well as the spokeswoman for "Figure Eight." 9/11 widow and victim's advocate Beverly Eckert died in a plane crash only days after meeting with President Obama. And if you're wondering, that's not ironic. And then there were five, after munchkin Clarence Swensen was gone. It wasn't just Hollywood script writers who ended up on the black list during the McCarthy era. William Price was one of 35 journalists called before the Senate Internal Security Subcommittee in 1955. He refused to invoke the fifth amendment to protect himself. Instead he declared that he was protected by the first amendment. He was fired the next day. You may be wondering why the "economic indicators" and the conditions you see around you rarely seem in alignment. But you won't be able to ask Raymond Saulnier who devised the indicators while at the National Bureau of Economic Research during the Eisenhower administration. Robley Rex was my distant relative (you'll have to excuse me for not being able to follow the combination of X-removed and Nth-degree of cousinhood). On his death, Frank Buckles became the last surviving World War I veteran from the United States. If your Chatty Cathy is ailing, you may need to count on home remedies. Irving Chais, owner of the New York Doll Hospital, is no longer available. His stories ranged from the painfully realistic recollections of his childhood internment in a Japanese prison camp, to jungles made of glass and future worlds were songs compose themselves. Whatever the venue J. G. Ballard fixed his subjects with searing insight and unflinching clarity. If you wandered away from the Big Two during the 2004 election season, you might have been enticed to vote for the Personal Choice Party, especially if you had fond teenage memories of the vice-presidential candidate and, um, multi-talented former "Ivory soap girl" Marilyn Chambers. Everyone remembers Gygax, but if you've ever rolled a 20-sided die, you owe equal thanks to Dave Arneson who was the co-creator of Dungeons & Dragons and the originator of many of the basics behind every RPG that followed. In 1993, George Tiller was shot in both arms. He did not let this stop him from returning to work and helping women caught in the most difficult of circumstances. He continued in his work despite daily harassment. He continued in his work despite being labeled a "baby killer" no less than 28 times by Bill O'Reilly. He continued despite lies told about him by O'Reilly and others. He continued until an anti-abortion activist entered the church where he was attending worship, and shot George Tiller through the eye at close range. It's easy to think of a nun as someone who has stepped away from society, but Carol Anne O'Marie not only ran a shelter for homeless women, she was the author of 10 mystery novels -- novels that featured an elderly nun who solves crimes. If you visit the site of one of America's great shames, the Manzanar Internment Camp, you can see the desk and typewriter of Togo Tanaka on display. It was at this desk that Tanaka reported on the often ugly conditions inside the camp from the perspective of the people being held there. His work to document what went on at Manzanar made him a target for both the government and his fellow internees. When Robert Furchgott worked out the factors in endothelial cells that causes blood vessels to relax, he received a Nobel Prize. He didn't receive any payment from the most famous product of his work -- Viagra. Not only did Wayne Allwine provide the voice of Mickey Mouse for more than 30 years, he was married to the woman who provides the voice for Minnie Mouse. At 6'7" former football player Rodger McFarlane didn't fit the stereotype of a gay man. Starting as a volunteer, he became the first director of the Gay Men's Health Crisis and helped organize many programs in the fight against AIDS. At a time when America appears to show disdain for international law, it's worth remembering "the George Washington of modern international law" Henry King. A U.S. Prosecutor at the Nuremberg Trials, King continued to work on a legal approach to war crimes for decades. It was at his insistence that the International Criminal Court added starting a war as a war crime. If you were an African-American reader of romance novels before 1980, the number of books available where the couples were African-American was more than limited, it was nonexistent. Elsie Washington changed that with her novel Entwined Destines. Martha Mason was only 11 years old when polio forced her into an iron lung. She would remain in the device for the next 60 years. Despite this, she graduated first in her class at Wake Forest, worked as a reporter for her local newspaper, and in 2003 wrote a book about her life. Whether it was giving voice to numerous characters in animated films, or providing animated comic relief for partners ranging from Burt Reynolds to Dean Martin, Dom Deluise was sure to bring a smile. The supply-side economics that Jack Kemp championed helped set up decades in which the wages of average Americans stagnated and those at the top benefited. But Kemp's example in looking at the issues of racism and immigration provide lessons that many Republicans, and some Democrats, should take to heart. "The Straight Shooter" Joe Bowman performed his amazing feats of marksmanship for rodeo fans, gun show goers, police SWAT teams, FBI agents, NASA astronauts, film stars, and foreign dignitaries. You're going to have to come up with a better pitch, because Billy Mays is unavailable to move your product. By last spring, the face (among other things) that launched a million wall posters was indelibly marked by the long, hard and public struggle with cancer, but Farah Fawcett continued the fight to the end. When Farrah and her fellow Angels appeared on television in 1976, it was easy to dismiss the characters as high-kicking models who often found themselves in scenarios that involved limited clothing. But they were also tough, clever, and constantly outsmarting the men who underestimated them. Farrah went on to show that she had real acting chops to go with the no-so-real karate chops. If there was any departure in 2009 that both shocked and generated discussion, it was that of the "King of Pop" Michael Jackson. Jackson was... immensely talented. America's best-known sidekick had some tough times in his final years, but for many of us Ed McMahon will always be the jovial presence at the edge of the scene, helping to make both host and guests comfortable with a few well-timed words and a booming laugh. 100% of respondents note that Alec Gallup, chairman of the Gallup Poll and son of the founder, handed off his duties this year. When cruise ships ferry "explorers" to Antarctica with regularity, it's easy to forget that once Edith Ronne was the only American woman who had ever been there. There was a period of little to no sunspot activity lasting from around 1645 to 1715. The relationship between low solar activity and the climate is still open to question, but it's a sure thing that Jack Eddy put the data together and named the Maunder Minimum. If that Farah poster generated nostalgia, then David Carradine, despite roles in over 100 films, is probably forever wandering the west as Kwai Chang Caine. If not, just let Black Mamba know that no one needs to kill Bill. David Eddings had a theory about how to create a fantasy novels, an approach that some thought made his work formulaic. To investigate you might want to read just a couple of his novels. Or maybe a couple more. And a couple more after that, and... The way the civil rights movement would bring the GOP to power in the South might have been surprising to some politicians, but not to G. Alexander Heard an adviser to both JFK and LBJ, who predicted the change in 1952. Sure, winning that hundred-yard dash at the Olympics may be tough, but it's equally tough to set world records the way Waldo McBurney did it -- by outliving all competition in his age group. The multiple world record holder in the 100+ category was 106 when he died this year. Here's a confession: as a teenager, I wasn't watching those Marilyn Chambers films, I was reading books by John Keel. Whether it was the inter dimensional beings of Strange Creatures From Time and Space or the unmatched weirdness of The Mothman Prophecies no one sold a UFO conspiracy like Keel. If you see a wiener-mobile roll past draped in black, it's because Oscar Mayer, jr. has gone. No matter how momentous the events, their effect is limited without someone to tell the story. William Emerson was a southerner who understood the southern mindset, and was able to out-talk, out-joke, and out-bluster everyone in range while reporting the often painful and occasionally joyous truth of what was happening in America.
An important chapter in our history has come to an end. Our country has lost a great leader, who picked up the torch of his fallen brothers and became the greatest United States Senator of our time.
If you love the gentle piano work in the background of Brige over Troubled Water that's the work of Larry Knechtel, who also performed on tracks for Elvis, the Beach Boys, and Bread. Both science fiction readers and science fiction writers have long been grateful to Donald Grant, who took a chance on books that didn't always seem commercial and produced volumes of exceptional quality. Sometimes August is the cruelest month. Not only Ted but Eunice Kennedy Shriver left us in August. Founder of what would become the Special Olympics and one of the founders of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, she was every bit a Kennedy. Need an expert on the dulcimer? What about the autoharp, banjo, fiddle, mandolin, and guitar? Mike Seeger played them all, and did so beautifully -- but never so well as when he joined his family in the New Lost City Ramblers. The popular princess, the jock, the rebel from a troubled background, the nerd, and the girl sunk into despair. Why are they all hanging around the school together? Because John Hughes wrote them that way on his way to defining the teenage years of a generation. Budd Schulberg might not have written about teen angst, but with a few little films like On the Waterfront and A Face in the Crowd to his credit, I suppose he can be forgiven. For proof that you can think that someone is wrong on almost every point, and still find them witty and entertaining, you don't have to look any further than William Safire. Or should that be "farther"? Without Bill, we may never be sure. Why don't more conservatives harness the kind of arguments that Safire used to promote his positions? Because none of them has half the intelligence or one tenth the oratorical firepower. For decades, the source of the best Hollywood inside info wasn't a web site or even the tabloids. It was Armand "Army" Archerd. Don't remember Milton Supman? How about comedian, host, and perennial game-show guest Soupy Sales? If the theme songs for the Addam's Family and Green Acres are still stuck in your head after four decades, you can thank composer Vic Mizzy for these and many more. This was a bad year for Navajo Code Talkers with at least five of their few remaining members being lost over the course of the summer. Lester Shubin served in the Army during World War II, which might have been his inspiration in creating the Kevlar vest. Her list of friends reads like a who's-who of civil rights, so it's no surprise that 107-year old Ann Nixon Cooper was featured in President Obama's speech on election night 2008. I liked Brittany Murphy darn it. The girl did sassy really well. If there's a middle school student (or science teacher) in your home then you're probably familiar with (and fond of) the characters from Beakman's World. There's no actor in a rat suit I'll miss more than Mark Ritts who played "Lester" on the show -- probably not what a guy with an lit degree from Harvard expected to do with his life. If you passed Andy Hallet in the street, you might not recognize him. In his best-known role, Hallet played the green singing-dancing demon "Lorne" on Angel. The Clamshell Alliance is one of those names that rings few bells today, but when Guy Chichester help found the group in opposition to the Seabrook Station Nuclear Power Plant, it helped to kick off a new generation of environmental activism. As always, this is a hugely incomplete list filled more with names that caught my eye than with those who were most important to the world -- or to you. I encourage you to add more.
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