You may have already read this on my friend's blog. But I'm double posting!
Today's issue of Interesting News is brought to you courtesy of the good ol' kittenpause. Find me at kittenpaws33.blogspot.com.
A Public Service Announcement on behalf of tall girls and short guys everywhere
What is it about tall guys (particularly of the over 6'2" variety) that they tend to be attracted to absurdly short girls? It just isn't fair. I mean really. I would like to put forth the theory (and I believe my dear host Aaron is in agreement with me) that ideally a girl/guy relationship should consist of a shorter girl who is within five or so inches of the respective male's height. This is preferable for several reasons, most of which I will attempt to illustrate with anecdotes.
1. This is better for the guy's neck. Looking down at girls that much shorter all the time can really give you a crick in your neck. My one uncle, who I estimate to be about 6'8", although I forget which uncle it was so he could have been 6'5", once asked my 5'11" mother to dance with him for a minute. He decided that that was the ideal height a girl should be - low enough for cuddling, but not so short that awkward leaning was necessary... I think the woman he married was about 5'4". Really people, it's bad for all of us.
Actually all my uncles are ridiculously tall and married ridiculously short women...
2. This is ideal for the girl in the relationship because she can wear heels and still be comfortably shorter than the guy (and leaves the guy looking very manly I might add). Generally this is not a problem for short girls. They can almost always wear heels and be shorter. But tall girls, who are say, 5'8" really need those extra inches so that the guy's eye level is never at, say, her boobs.
3. What about the short guys? They need to feel acceptably manly. If the short girls go run away with the tall guys then the short guys are left only with medium to tall girls. And any of these cases result in the guy being shorter. Add heels into the equation and well... it's trouble!
Listen, short girls, I know tall guys are attractive. And tall guys I understand that it's nice to feel so powerful standing next to a girl. But you're tall anyway! You'll be taller than most any girl! And if it's bad for a 5'8" girl, what about the 6'3" girls? Really, please, please, try to fight the draw of domination and being dominated. Tall girls would like their love interests to be well above boob level...
I do have a theory that this is evolution's fault. I have a feeling that the tall/short matches happen to normalize the offspring. But I can't help feeling that the other matches in which the girls are tall and the guys are short rarely happen. And this indicates to me that it isn't all evolutionary. There must be a societal influence. Either that or short girls and tall guys are just more attractive... but then why are models 5'9" or taller? Society has royally effed this one up.
I propose the coalition of short guys/tall girls to combat this societal issue. Short guys want the short girls and tall girls want the tall guys. We must unite in the attempt to stop these bonds between tall guys and short girls from forming. I keep seeing my short friends who are 5'4" with guys 6'2" or taller. It's not fair girls, it's just not. Please, on behalf of tall girls and short guys everywhere, cap the height difference at approximately one tenth of your height. If the top of your head is below his chin, it's just too much of a difference.
And tall girls are sick of scrounging for the short girls scraps!
Short guys, do you have any comments? Any ideas on how to remedy this situation?
All right, thanks for taking this not-so-brief kittenpause.
Sunday, July 19, 2009
Monday, July 13, 2009
Pre Movie Hype (And Why Books Are Better)
Does anybody know what time it is? That's right, it's time for a KITTENPAUSE
So a couple of little minimercials before I dive into the meat of this post:
1. Later this week (July 18th to be exact) I'll be appearing as a guest blogger on my friend Aaron's blog, Interesting News, and I won't be around to double post that particular gem of my brain blabber until Sunday night, so this is a little heads up for everyone.
2. I'm going to Otakon this weekend and I'm a little leery of the whole adventure. It seemed like a much better idea back in January. Now I'm not even sure who's going, and I wish it was just a huge Harry Potter Con. I want to go to LeakyCon next year :(
3. All aboard the failboat! I have not succeeded in my plans for YouTube domination! All I have managed to do is post one rather crappy video of a song I wrote in which the sound is terrible and I apparently and unable to change chords in a reasonable amount of time. On that note, does anyone care if I ever post anything on YouTube ever again? Should I become a brilliant skit star? What will boost the rocket of my internet fame? Why am I even worried about that when I have school?
ALL RIGHT - to the crux of this post! Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince comes out tomorrow night!
I am rather excited about this movie, but it has chiefly served as a source of nostalgia for Harry Potter midnight book release parties of awesome (I've been to all of those since the fourth book came out - thanks for driving me mommie :) ), jealously of the actors who get to pretend to be Hermione, et al., and get paid for it and become ridiculously wealthy and just have a generally awesome existence, and finally anger over what the movie is just going to leave out because there simply isn't time in that medium to cover all the details of the book - all the glorious, delicious details.
Normally that wouldn't bother me so much. Okay, the movie doesn't have all the amazing parts that the book has (Hermione and the potions in Sorcerer's Stone, blast-ended skrewts, Rita Skeeter is an animagus, Winky the house-elf in Goblet of Fire, Cho Chang isn't a dirty traitor in Order of the Pheonix...) but it's still pretty good. The problem arises when I meet the people (you know who you are, and I'm mad at you!) who have never tried to read the books, who couldn't care less about Potter mania, and particularly those who love the movie but won't read the books because "reading is for lamebrains."
This just makes me mad. For one, reading is awesome. I am a strong proponent of reading, particularly reading just for pleasure and not analyzing the heck out of books. After all, much of my childhood was spent with my nose in a book. I think the results of my bibliophilia (Is that a word? It should be...) are obvious in my academic record and large vocabulary. But aside from the general awesomeness of reading, Harry Potter is in a class all of its own. J.K. Rowling may take a lot of flack for luring people to the evils of witchcraft, but she does not even remotely decry the beliefs of Christianity (His Dark Materials author Philip Pullman has been known to do this on occasion, but I love his books too. They're works of fiction people! So what if occasionally I want to pretend I can do magic? I'm an astrophysicist-in-training; there are weirder things out there). Aside from that, there has been many a friend of mind who did not enjoy reading but loved Harry Potter. I get it if you aren't a fantasy lover. Okay if you want to read realistic fiction. But if you love the movies and refuse to read the books? You're missing out on so much of Jo's writing style and minor characters that films just don't have the time to which to devote the detail. There are all the funny little lines and bloopers and plot holes (in the first edition of Goblet of Fire, Jo's editor had told her to switch the order that Lily and James came out of the wand. James came out first and then Lily. This led to much speculation about Lily/James Polyjuice potions, as the characters were supposed to come out in the opposite order they were killed).
All I have to say is: Read the books first, they're better. YOU get to imagine what the characters look like. Even if this results in anger when the actors don't look the way they were supposed to look, at least you can still have your separate vision of them. They aren't just Rupert Grint or Emma Watson or Daniel Radcliffe.
On a side note, I have plans to give people copies of books to read as gifts. Then they'll have to read them because they were gifts. Good idea, no?
Thanks for entertaining this little whim of mine. I think I'll probably include a reaction to the movie later.
Oh and if you're in the kittenpause book club and you haven't read Harry Potter, that's assignment number one. Get back to me in a month, I'll graciously accept your thanks :)
KITTENPLAY
So a couple of little minimercials before I dive into the meat of this post:
1. Later this week (July 18th to be exact) I'll be appearing as a guest blogger on my friend Aaron's blog, Interesting News, and I won't be around to double post that particular gem of my brain blabber until Sunday night, so this is a little heads up for everyone.
2. I'm going to Otakon this weekend and I'm a little leery of the whole adventure. It seemed like a much better idea back in January. Now I'm not even sure who's going, and I wish it was just a huge Harry Potter Con. I want to go to LeakyCon next year :(
3. All aboard the failboat! I have not succeeded in my plans for YouTube domination! All I have managed to do is post one rather crappy video of a song I wrote in which the sound is terrible and I apparently and unable to change chords in a reasonable amount of time. On that note, does anyone care if I ever post anything on YouTube ever again? Should I become a brilliant skit star? What will boost the rocket of my internet fame? Why am I even worried about that when I have school?
ALL RIGHT - to the crux of this post! Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince comes out tomorrow night!
I am rather excited about this movie, but it has chiefly served as a source of nostalgia for Harry Potter midnight book release parties of awesome (I've been to all of those since the fourth book came out - thanks for driving me mommie :) ), jealously of the actors who get to pretend to be Hermione, et al., and get paid for it and become ridiculously wealthy and just have a generally awesome existence, and finally anger over what the movie is just going to leave out because there simply isn't time in that medium to cover all the details of the book - all the glorious, delicious details.
Normally that wouldn't bother me so much. Okay, the movie doesn't have all the amazing parts that the book has (Hermione and the potions in Sorcerer's Stone, blast-ended skrewts, Rita Skeeter is an animagus, Winky the house-elf in Goblet of Fire, Cho Chang isn't a dirty traitor in Order of the Pheonix...) but it's still pretty good. The problem arises when I meet the people (you know who you are, and I'm mad at you!) who have never tried to read the books, who couldn't care less about Potter mania, and particularly those who love the movie but won't read the books because "reading is for lamebrains."
This just makes me mad. For one, reading is awesome. I am a strong proponent of reading, particularly reading just for pleasure and not analyzing the heck out of books. After all, much of my childhood was spent with my nose in a book. I think the results of my bibliophilia (Is that a word? It should be...) are obvious in my academic record and large vocabulary. But aside from the general awesomeness of reading, Harry Potter is in a class all of its own. J.K. Rowling may take a lot of flack for luring people to the evils of witchcraft, but she does not even remotely decry the beliefs of Christianity (His Dark Materials author Philip Pullman has been known to do this on occasion, but I love his books too. They're works of fiction people! So what if occasionally I want to pretend I can do magic? I'm an astrophysicist-in-training; there are weirder things out there). Aside from that, there has been many a friend of mind who did not enjoy reading but loved Harry Potter. I get it if you aren't a fantasy lover. Okay if you want to read realistic fiction. But if you love the movies and refuse to read the books? You're missing out on so much of Jo's writing style and minor characters that films just don't have the time to which to devote the detail. There are all the funny little lines and bloopers and plot holes (in the first edition of Goblet of Fire, Jo's editor had told her to switch the order that Lily and James came out of the wand. James came out first and then Lily. This led to much speculation about Lily/James Polyjuice potions, as the characters were supposed to come out in the opposite order they were killed).
All I have to say is: Read the books first, they're better. YOU get to imagine what the characters look like. Even if this results in anger when the actors don't look the way they were supposed to look, at least you can still have your separate vision of them. They aren't just Rupert Grint or Emma Watson or Daniel Radcliffe.
On a side note, I have plans to give people copies of books to read as gifts. Then they'll have to read them because they were gifts. Good idea, no?
Thanks for entertaining this little whim of mine. I think I'll probably include a reaction to the movie later.
Oh and if you're in the kittenpause book club and you haven't read Harry Potter, that's assignment number one. Get back to me in a month, I'll graciously accept your thanks :)
KITTENPLAY
Wednesday, July 8, 2009
How to Catch Fireflies: A Brief Tutorial
It’s time for a brief kittenpause!
I know you all have been dying to hear from me! I mean, it's been several weeks. Illness (and sunburn) can be distracting!
My guest post on InterestingNews is coming up soon! -July 18-
I think I asked for a vote last post and with a rousing two votes it had something to do with fun in the summer. I have decided that this necessitates a quick tutorial on capturing those flighty fancies with the sulfur butts - that's right this is a HOW TO CATCH FIREFLIES post (or lightning bugs if you prefer)
STEP 1: First of all, make sure fireflies are in your area. This can't be done without the little buggers, after all.
STEP 2: You need to be outside when the fireflies are out. Generally speaking, they appear around dusk. Sometimes you have rogue fireflies that like to stay out late - The teenagers of the species if you will...
STEP 3: Pick a firefly. Track its movements by attempting to predict where it will next glow. Move slowly toward it. If possible have low lighting around.
STEP 4: Once you've picked your firefly, attempt to sihlouhette it against the low lighting so you can see it not only when it blinks. Continue moving towards the firefly in a low crouch with both hands slightly extended and cupped.
STEP 5: When you're close enough to the firefly quickly attempt to entrap it in your cupped hands, as if your hands were a Venus Fly Trap. Once you start moving in, they'll try to evade you by going higher.
Hurrah! You have caught your firelfy (lightning bug)! There are other techniques such as the come-from-under and just make it land on your hand, and the downward swipe grab. As you advance in the circuits, you will have time to refine your technique.
Also, if you fail to catch one on your first attempt it's okay to target another specimen! I suggest naming them, but that may just be me.
Don't forget to free your new friend! The fun is in the catching, not the keeping!
I hope you've enjoyed your quick break. But now it's time to press PLAY on your life!
I know you all have been dying to hear from me! I mean, it's been several weeks. Illness (and sunburn) can be distracting!
My guest post on InterestingNews is coming up soon! -July 18-
I think I asked for a vote last post and with a rousing two votes it had something to do with fun in the summer. I have decided that this necessitates a quick tutorial on capturing those flighty fancies with the sulfur butts - that's right this is a HOW TO CATCH FIREFLIES post (or lightning bugs if you prefer)
STEP 1: First of all, make sure fireflies are in your area. This can't be done without the little buggers, after all.
STEP 2: You need to be outside when the fireflies are out. Generally speaking, they appear around dusk. Sometimes you have rogue fireflies that like to stay out late - The teenagers of the species if you will...
STEP 3: Pick a firefly. Track its movements by attempting to predict where it will next glow. Move slowly toward it. If possible have low lighting around.
STEP 4: Once you've picked your firefly, attempt to sihlouhette it against the low lighting so you can see it not only when it blinks. Continue moving towards the firefly in a low crouch with both hands slightly extended and cupped.
STEP 5: When you're close enough to the firefly quickly attempt to entrap it in your cupped hands, as if your hands were a Venus Fly Trap. Once you start moving in, they'll try to evade you by going higher.
Hurrah! You have caught your firelfy (lightning bug)! There are other techniques such as the come-from-under and just make it land on your hand, and the downward swipe grab. As you advance in the circuits, you will have time to refine your technique.
Also, if you fail to catch one on your first attempt it's okay to target another specimen! I suggest naming them, but that may just be me.
Don't forget to free your new friend! The fun is in the catching, not the keeping!
I hope you've enjoyed your quick break. But now it's time to press PLAY on your life!
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