Title Chapters for Harry Potter agus an Órcloch

For my own entertainment.

Harry Potter agus an Órchloch : Harry Potter and the the Stone of Gold*

Caibidil 1: An Gasúr a Tháinig Slán : The Young Boy Who Arrived Safe/Got Through Safe

Caibidil 2: An Ghloine a d'Imigh As : The Glass That Disappeared (From Itself)

Caibidil 3: Na Litreacha : The Letters

Caibidil 4: Coimeádaí na hEochracha : Keeper of the Keys

Caibidil 5: Go Diagon Alley : To Diagon Alley

Caibidil 6: An Turas ó Ardán a Naoi agus Trí Ceathrú : The Trip From Platform Nine and Three Quarters

Caibidil 7: An Hata Sórtala : The Hat of Sorting

Caibidil 8: Máistir na bPosóidí : Master of Potions

Caibidil 9: Comhrac ar Uair an Mheán Oíche : Action** at the Hour of Midnight

Caibidil 10: Oíche Shamhna : Hallowe'en

Caibidil 11: Quidditch : Quidditch

Caibidil 12: Scathán na Mianta : The Mirror of Wishes***

Caibidil 13: Nicolas Flamel : Nicolas Flamel

Caibidil 14: Dragan Dronnach na hIorua :  The Hump-Backed Dragon from Norway

Caibidil 15: An Fhoraois Thoirmiscthe : The Forbidden Forest

Caibidil 16: Tríd an gComhla Síos : Through the Downward Door

Caibidil 17: Fear an Dá Aghaidh : The Man of Two Faces

This isn't meant as jab of the "haw haw, look at Irish trying to be relevant, I didn't work at Irish in school because I'm incredibly cool and interesting, a fact I will prove by monologuing about how I like to not work at things" sort****. I think it's fantastic that wee small Gaeilgeoirí can read Harry Potter as Gaeilge! I just think it's interesting to wonder how much nuance I've missed by reading translations of books, and how clunky English translations sound to speakers of the original language.

Time to learn every language in the world, just in case.

* But not made of gold, pertaining to gold.

** But strategic action, like in chess.

*** Jesus, lads! Spoilers!

**** I have opinions about people who think that not making an effort is somehow an interesting personality trait. If I'm honest, it's just one opinion. You don't want to work at a thing? Cool! Don't! I am probably not interested in your spiel supporting your (in)actions.

Cambridge!

I visited my friend Steph in Cambridge last weekend!

 

1. We nearly entered this cardboard boat race, but were hampered by not having collected cardboard and made a boat.

2. There was garden party in the Chaplain's garden. There was a cake-baking competition, and we came second with the chocolate and raspberry cake in the bottom right! I also won a notebook in a raffle, and came first with two of Steph's friends in a trivia competition. Best garden party I've ever been to.

3. There was a punt race one evening. Another team were dressed as bananas.

4. St. John's College from the back

5. Steampunk-looking tower on top of the library.

6. The Bridge of Sighs in St. John's College, the most Hogwarts-esque - and therefore best - structure in a town full of Hogwarts-esque buildings.

7. We punted down the river and had a picnic. Some ducks tried to muscle in. On the way back a duckling tried to jump into the boat. And I didn't fall off while punting!

8. Steph behind the door of the St. John's Chapel tower, like some sort of terrifying tower-goblin.

9. The chapel tower from half-way up.

10. The view from the top.

11. Fireworks at the Trinity College May Ball. It was the night before St. John's, and everyone sat on the backs and watched. I always forget how much I like fireworks.

12. The theme of the St. John's May Ball was "Ars Gratia Artis." Each court had a different theme. This was the 'street art' court (titled "Mean Streets of Cambridge").

13. Fireworks at the St. John's May Ball.

The May Ball was excellent fun, more like a black tie festival than a ball proper. I also drank more Pimms over the course of the weekend than I otherwise would in a year or several. Cambridge.

Dublin's fair city

He wasn't even trying to be funny:

"I really like Dublin. It's not a Paradise, but it makes you not mind that you're going to die."

From one of the visiting American playwrights at the Dublin Gay Theatre Festival. (He actually said it this morning and was pushed to recount it by their techie. I feel it still counts.)

In progress

I have a few bits and pieces ongoing at the moment.

I stopped by This Is Knit's sale with a friend (I think it's fair that I don't have to be Not Buying Yarn if there's a sale on) and he bought this Debbie Bliss Winter Garden for me to make him a hat. I'm using the Hat Fit For A Fella pattern (Ravelry pattern page here), which I've made before, removing the brim and using my modification from the last time I made it. The cables have eaten the yarn and I still have a few inches to go, so while I've been failing to go back in and get some more, I've started working on...

a jumper! I bought this yarn (Debbie Bliss cotton, I do like cotton) as an end-of finals-present to myself last year, started this tunic (Ravelry pattern page here), realised half-way through that it was the wrong sized and ripped it out, re-started it, realised half-way through that it was the wrong size and ripped it out, and then left all the yarn in a bag until now, unable to bring myself to touch it. I think it was a good move, as a third failed attempt would have bred supervillainy-inducing levels of frustration and resentment, and that would be a very underwhelming origin story.

In the year's interim I went off the pattern - or at least how it would look in this shade - and decide to make this v-neck instead. I think I'll get more wear out of it than I would the tunic.

It's top-down and has raglan sleeves, both of which are new to me in a jumper, and I've already had to restart once because "At the same time" is my enemy. I like how it's turning out, and now I don't feel guilty for having the bag of yarn sitting in the corner of my room, silently judging me.

I spent Saturday and Sunday hiking some forty kilometres of the Wicklow Way with some members of my volunteer group. It's easy to forget, especially living in Dublin, that Ireland is quite breathtakingly stunning, despite the national pastime of complaining about Ireland.

The second photo is of Powerscourt Waterfall from a height and distance, and the last one is of Glendalough valley. When we were walking across the planks in the fourth picture, the wind was so strong and the hill so exposed that I had to lean into the wind to end up somewhat vertical, and still nearly got blown off into the bog a few times. (You might think bogs are for low-lying flat land, not the top of hills, but you would be wrong.) We got very lucky with the weather, and I got sunburned wearing the one racerback top I own, because of course I did. It's not Summer until I have uneven tan-lines.

I'm currently a a tech volunteer for the International Dublin Gay Theatre Festival. So far this has meant moving props between shows, but they were important props. I've sat in on two plays so far, because I am the kind of very cultured and important person who sees two plays a week - premieres, no less. Bash: Latterday Plays is very intense, dark, harrowing and excellent. My Second Self is awfully sweet, quietly hopeful, and funnier than I was expecting. The program changes next week, so I'd recommend either or both if you're in Dublin this week!

The dullest conversation I have on a regular basis.

Oh, sorry, I can't have those, I'm vegetarian. Thanks for the offer though! No, not that long, about three years now. Mainly the environmental side of things. Em... Beans are pretty good for protein, and eggs, and then there's tofu and quorn. Yeah, I still eat eggs and dairy. Why yes, I suppose I am still indirectly supporting the beef industry. No, I think morally there's nothing wrong with eating meat. Well if I were keeping my own animals and knew they had a decent quality of life, I don't think there'd be anything wrong with eating them, but I think I'd get attached, so I wouldn't want to. Well yeah, if I were stranded on a desert island I'd eat whatever I could catch. I don't know, eating roadkill seems like a sketchy idea anyway, if you have alternatives. You know what, I'm going to go grab a drink, I'll talk to you later!

I like to ascribe people the best possible intentions, and most people who ask about being vegetarianism are authentically trying to be nice, and to ask me about something they think I am interested in. Unfortunately, I find the vegetarianism debate pretty dull, and I think the only points worth making come off preachier than I care to be at a casual get-together. (My stock answer used to be "Mainly environmental reasons, plus you can't know without checking what conditions the animals are kept in" but I whittled it down to be considerate and avoid potentially making people squirmy.)

To set my terms, I am vegetarian for the following reasons:

• Meat production accounts for some 25% of industrial carbon dioxide emissions. (25% was the last figure I heard from a scientific source some years ago, it may have risen or fallen since then without altering the underlying point.)
• Factory farms are pretty rotten, and the laws in some countries are quite lax with what constitutes 'free range'.
• I am pretty into reducing the net suffering I cause before I die.

I am an unabashed hypocrite in the following regards:

• I still wear leather shoes. (I could say that this is because leather shoes last longer than fake leather, so it's more environmentally sound, but I haven't looked into the figure for that at all. Really I just don't like shoe shopping, and don't want to spend ages looking for something non-leather which will fall apart in six months anyway.)
• I'm not vegan. The factory farm argument I made above applies particularly to battery hens, and buying free range eggs might be rather meaningless. Also, according to someone smug at a party, the male calves of dairy cattle are still sold to beef farms if they're suitable, so really I'm not solving anything.

If people are thinking about going vegetarian, or like vegetarian cooking, those are perfectly fun to talk about, I really like food! If someone is treating it as an exciting intellectual debate, in which they try to pick holes in an argument I never made, that is simply not interesting, and there's no way to leave the conversation that doesn't come across as rude or conceding that my worldview is flawed and I am terrible.

But really, shouldn't you be looking for farms that treat the animals well and supporting those, so that they can thrive and not get pushed out of business by factory farming? What about raising your own animals? Do you check where your produce comes from, because some farmers in Third World countries get a pretty bad deal. Are you saying you care about animals more than people? What if the animal died of natural causes? But, like, meat is SO GOOD. Shouldn't you be eating the most sustainable meat? You know some people can't be vegetarian, so what are they meant to do? But we evolved to eat meat! EVER THINK OF THAT?

Some valid points, except I never claimed to be practising the optimal form of reducing meat-related carbon dioxide while also not supporting cruel living conditions. (Also: what people who can't be vegetarian and healthy should do is not be vegetarian. I don't know why people even put that to me, or anyone. And meat is delicious! That is also a non-point.) Given that the answer I give when people ask why I'm vegetarian carries the moral weight of turning off the tap while you brush your teeth, the fact that some people use me to pick apart arguments I haven't made (deliberately, because they lead to tedious conversations) rather makes it seem as though they think I believe myself to have the moral high ground, they themselves believe that on some level, and if they can get me to admit I'm not one hundred per cent consistent and rational then I will be one hundred percent wrong, and they will be the most rational and correct person in the world forever, and have no need to change their behaviour.*

That is a really big mess of insecurities to throw on a stranger just because they passed on the rummy bears.

Short story long, I don't see any moral issue with eating meat. I also don't see any moral issue with wearing shoes. I do think that buying, say, Converse is not morally neutral, as you're implicitly supporting Nike's factory conditions. Going vegetarian or vegan means a few weeks or months of eating boring food while you try to find new recipes, means all but always getting the pasta option in a restaurant, and may not be financially or physiologically feasible for everyone. I don't think there's some moral onus on anyone to become vegetarian or vegan. (Especially vegan. No-one loves a vegan.**) I do think that people should be honest with themselves about where there food comes from, and make an intellectually honest decision, but I would rather they not bounce the thought process off me, because good Heavens, it is simply not interesting.

(I could also gripe all day about angry vegans/vegetarians, but I'll leave it at saying that the term 'carnivore' really grinds my gears because humans are omnivores, and also the term 'bloodmouth' for omnivores is hilarious, as well as a handy red flag that an argument is going to be codswallop.)

*I also get this a lot with volunteering. "Well, going to a homework club for two hours a week isn't exactly solving the problems in the education system and the disadvantages experienced by schools in underprivileged areas, is it? And some charities are more for the volunteers to feel good than to actually fix things in the long-term, and obviously there's no way to check out any charitable groups, so I'll just take the high road and do nothing at all."

** I have known and been fond of several vegans.

I may not be cut out for academia

I had this evening earmarked for asking a PI to apply for a personal grant with me, and catching up on my Coursera. It's a quarter to eleven, and so far I have flitted anxiously between social media sites, eaten all the chocolate I bought to fuel myself through the taxing process of writing a several-sentence email asking someone to invest time in me, and clicked 'Compose'.

Oh, and I've written everything you're read this far! So I feel like there's something to be said for that.

The problem with waiting this long is that my process of emailing people for a job involves writing a self-flagellating email about how great they are and how I don't deserve to work for them and apologising for even contacting them, and saying how it's perfectly understandable if they don't want to take me on, then paring away the grovelling until I sound like a functional, employable human. Unfortunately, the more I let it twist and turn in my mind the higher a level of apologies and self-deprecation I'm going to have to work down from. Currently, no-one will hire me from my first draft of an email because it will sound as though I'll spend all my time lying on the floor of the lab, wailing with self-loathing, not getting any work done and making people step across me.*

Dear Professor C,

I contacted you previously about the possibility of undertaking a PhD in your lab. As you may be aware, the deadline for the submission of applications to IRCSET is next month, and I was wondering if you would consider applying with me. I know you didn't reply to my email asking if it would help if I looked for personal grants elsewhere, and you probably would have contacted me if you wanted me in your lab and thought I had a chance of getting an IRCSET grant, and - oh. I see how it is. I'm sorry for wasting your time.

Best regards,

Jennifer

-

Dear Professor C,

As you may know, the deadline for applying to IRCSET is next month. I probably wouldn't get it, but I thought you might like to apply with me. There's only one award though, and I hear the application is quite hefty, and I understand if you're busy. I'd be very enthusiastic about working in your lab, but it's perfectly fine if you'd rather not have me!

Looking forward to hearing from you, unless you're too busy, in which case I'll take your silence as a no, and also I made you a cake,

Jennifer

-

Dear Professor C,

I really enjoyed my time in your lab before Christmas, and was wondering if you would consider applying for a personal grant with me. You won't even know I'm there, honestly. I won't even need a desk, I can just sit at a box in the corner. Of course, if you secretly think my work was terrible but are too nice to say so, I will completely understand.

All the best,

Jennifer

P.S. I'm not sure if you realised, but the Santa Hat I gave you as a Christmas thank-you was handmade. Just to say.

-

Dear Professor C,

OH GOD, I'M SORRY, DON'T LOOK AT ME.

I look forward to hearing from you.

All the best,

Jennifer

-

On the plus side, it's not too late to find a nice cave in  the woods and live off whatever squirrels I can trap. If I only trap the grey squirrels I'd be doing an ecological service, too. It's comforting to have a fall-back option.

*I am good at lab-work! I got a First in my thesis project, and it dragged my overall grade up to a First, and I am good at seeing how the literature connects together! I just worry about sounding arrogant in unsolicited emails, and so I throw myself wholeheartedly in the polar opposite direction.

Joss Whedon - Nice Guy among Nice Guys

I have a somewhat childish reaction when something I dislike becomes popular. I'm quite happy to dislike something quietly until I keep seeing on Facebook or having conversations turn to how it's ORIGINAL or WITTY or GROUND-BREAKING. Like Avatar. The special effects were very pretty, and Sigourney Weaver was there. That doesn't come near trumping the fact that there was no plot to speak of, and the dialogue was bad, and it wasn't an interesting retelling of the story it was telling, and it created a world which it failed to make interesting or explore well, and if you're going to make up science you need to explain why it's not stupid or I will judge your film as stupid unless you save it by making the rest of the film not stupid, and during one of the SPLOSIONS battle scenes at the end I consciously thought "Oh god, I am so bored, when will this end," and I am not easily bored, plus I saw it in 3D, a medium which has, worryingly, failed to die a death.

All that said, the only reason I have all of those flaws to hand is because people responded to my "Eh, the special effects were good but I didn't think it was a good film," with "But what about X?" X WAS BAD. IF X IS SOMETHING THAT MAKES A FILM GOOD, AND I DIDN'T ENJOY THE FILM, IT MEANS I THOUGHT X WAS BAD.

And so it is with Joss Whedon! I like his shows, but I do not like the man. If I watched his shows and never heard anything about him, or by him, I could just switch off my brain for the misogyny and laugh at the cleverly-constructed lines.

But no. Did you know Joss Whedon is SO FEMINIST? Because his shows are absolutely no indication of that, and it seems like if you believe in something, you should maybe have you art which is directed at teeenagers express that message! And did you know he writes STRONG FEMALE CHARACTERS, it's not just that tiny girls beating people up are what he's into, he is PROGRESSIVE.

No.

The fact that there is one conventionally hot girl who wears glasses or studies science or both!, instead of being conventionally hot and a cheerleader, in his shows and she is meant to be the Thinking Man's Hot Girl is quite skeezy in itself. It comes with the implication, as in the link, that sure, Anya and Buffy and Cordelia (and every female character in the show, seriously, where are the strong ugly characters) might be hot in an OBVIOUS sort of way, but with Willow and Fred, Nice Guys like Joss Whedon see through the outer hotness to the mind underneath that shares their specific interests! Enjoy learning new things from your total bimbo girlfriends who have hobbies and aspirations different to yours, jocks!

In Cabin In The Woods - with which I might be falling into my Avatar trap, because I though it was a diverting horror film that didn't do enough with the scope it gave itself, and the internet thought it TOTALLY TURNED THE GENRE ON ITS HEAD - rather than do something clever with the Stupid Slut Who Dies First trope, he... turns a med student into the Stupid Slut Who Dies first. (... ON ITS HEAD, SUCH A TWIST.) You could argue that his hands were tied by the genre, and he makes a feeble attempt to misdirect by having somewhere say her hair dye is making her stupid, but given the misogyny of the trope, if he really cared, he could have done something clever and non-sexist with it.

There's nothing that makes my skin crawl like the early seasons of Buffy though. I get that it's a lot of wish fulfilment - the most important girl in the world befriends the hottest losers in the school! (But doesn't have anything to do with Jonathan or those creepy losers, ew gross.) The hottest losers in the school fling zingers (or what are meant to be, whatever!) at lumbering jocks who are no match for their wit! It is a bit weird to work your sixteen-year-old esprit d'escalier into a TV show you make as a grown-up, obsessive even, but whatever makes you happy! 

What I can't look past is the treatment of Cordelia. She exemplifies the self-congratulatory pseudo-feminist maxim of "I have nothing but respect for women whom I deem respectable." She's mean for no reason, shallow, vapid, gets poor grades, and probably spurned Joss Whedon in high school. In the pilot, Jesse follows her around even though she has told him to leave her alone (but she's mean, and he's friends with the people who'll be the protagonists, so it's HILARIOUS, not creepy). In the next episode, Vampire Jesse appears behind her when she's dancing, leering and getting creepily up in her space. When she tells him to go away, he tells her to shut up. She looks confused. "Okay, just one dance, she says." Because bitches like that like jerks, not Nice Guys like teenage Joss Whedon! They deserve the abuse that's coming to them! Get it? FEMINISM!

Cordelia later redeems herself by going out with Joss Whedon, I mean, Xander, which compounds, rather than diminishing, the misogyny.

I honestly do like Joss Whedon's shows, but I'd enjoy them more if not for the hypocrisy. I can switch off my brain for a certain amount of misogyny - a girl's gotta leave the house and consume some media, after all. It's the hypocrisy of writing lazy sexism and then crowing over how feminist he is. He has described himself as a "lesbian in a man's body", which is something that some people do have to deal with in daily life, but coming from him sounds like the "I wish I were oppressed" or someone who thinks their privilege is so unhip.

From here.

But every time I see that quote floating around fandoms, and I want to sit Joss Whedon down and explain some things to stop ruining not-being-sexist for the people who put thought into not being sexist, and, while he's at it, to stop being sexist.

New Year's Resolutions and to-do list

When I was younger my New Year's Resolutions were always along the lines of "Be a better person", and other things so vague they were doomed to either obvious failure or obvious success, depending on the stringency of your definition. I've found I have more luck with specifics, and a lot of what I want to do this year has to do with developing or picking up skills. "Do X more" falls into the vagueness trap, but "Do this specific thing once" goes against the spirit of resolutions in my mind - they should be about continuous self-improvement. To compromise with myself, I've made a project list!

Take a First Aid course

This one might be a cheat to include, as I signed up for it at the start of December. It starts at the end of the month, and I still have to pay, so I hope they're not the sort to give spots away. It's something I've wanted to do for a long time, so I'm pretty excited!

Sew a bag

I have a few sewing projects under my belt, but I'd like to become more proficient at it.  There are some crafts I'd be happy to try once, and then leave be, and sewing isn't one of them, but the time required to set up and get a run at things, and the fact that it's stationary, are disadvantages it has against knitting. I have both the fabric and material to make an easy bag, though, and I have a few patterns I bought in a flurry of enthusiasm after my first sewing project, so I want to make a start on them.

Crochet Cthulhu

I learned to crochet hyperbolic shapes for my old job, and I use up spare yarn crocheting squares for the Henry Bear Blanketeers, but I can't do anything other than double and trebles. I learn better with a specific project, so I'm going to make Cthulhu from a pattern in Creepy Cute Crochet. I had been going to make this fella here for my brother for Christmas, but, having only looked at the pattern on Ravelry, I didn't realise the pattern was in Finnish, and Google translate let me down. (This meant my brother was the only one not opening a handmade gift from me on Christmas day and I am a terrible person.) This way I get to use a so-far-unused pattern book and get better at crochet! The pattern level is 'intermediate', but psshhht.

Build a robot capable of following a straight line

I'm excited about this one because everything else is just improving on something I can already do to some degree, but I have no idea about programming or electronics or building robots! I understand that the starter project for robotics is to build a robot capable of following a straight line, but obviously the eventual aim of my beginner's project will be to make the robot capable of feeling joy and love. It will be everything that I'm not. I yammered so much about my plan to build a robot that my boyfriend got me a beginner's Arduino set for Christmas, and an Arduino-compatible body, which looks like Wall-E if one uses a little imagination. Me and this robot, BFFz.

Learn The Heart Asks Pleasure First on piano

Because it makes me a little bit sad that there's a piano in the house and I can't play anything on it. I think I started to learn this piece years ago, before I gave up piano lessons and playing instruments generally, but I don't think I made it to the end, and it is incredibly beautiful. (I also think it's interesting that the sense of the piece is very different to the sense of the poem of the same name, by which I vaguely assume it to be inspired.)

Take a climbing course

I want to try a new sport, and want to do something about my feeble little arms. Twofer!

Run a half-marathon

There's one in the Phoenix Park in September, I can be ready by then! It will be nice not to expect this to happen when I walk into a sportswear shop or section.

Write a short horror story

I want to write anything that isn't precisely laid out facts, and short stories were my strength for the Leaving Cert. (I couldn't write discursive or persuasive essays without throwing in a qualifying, "But of course, I can see how I might be wrong and stupid and the exact opposite of what I've said may be the case", even though as Gaeilge it was "Níl aon dabht i m'intinn" and "Táimse go huile is go hiomlán i neamhaontais" all over the shop.)   Horror stories have a place in my heart, and I think it will be an enjoyable challenge because it's difficult to write a genuinely scary story.

I'll probably add to it over the course of the year - I want to take a language class, and join an Irish-speaking group to get mine back up to scratch, and start drawing again, and volunteer with kids once my Garda vetting for my new charity group comes through - but those will be a good start.

Linguistics, accuracy, utility and common courtesy.

I went to see The Hobbit today, and I was going to write about that, but it would only have been what I liked or didn't from a fanperson perspective. Instead, here are some of my opinions on grammar!

I am a bit of a nerd for grammar. In fifth and sixth year I spent a long time considering studying linguistics. My Leaving Cert Spanish teacher once told me that it was clear from my translations and essays that I had a very good grasp of English grammar, which transferred well in understanding the underlying principles. (Thanks, I speak it like a native!) I taught myself Latin for the Junior Cert because I wanted to understand the roots of words and a more rigid set of grammar rules. I will correct my own grammar in conversation rather than hope people don't notice, because it will irk me to leave it incorrect.

In a complete non-contradiction, there are few things that will make me negatively and immediately judge someone's entire character as hearing or seeing them correct someone else's grammar, in real life or online.

To get the exceptions out of the way: You might be a teacher, they might be learning a language and have asked you for pointers*, they might be learning a first language, they might have asked you to proofread a document. If there are others, I can't think of them at this time.

There's a line by Feynman in What Do You Care What Other People Think? that I can't find by skimming through it. He explains that in school he was a poor speller, and that it frustrated him that his teachers cared so much. If it was clear which word he was trying to use, why did it matter whether there were a few letters missing or rearranged? The lesson here isn't that, if you have a good grasp of grammar or are good at spelling, you are smarter than Richard Feynman. It's that Richard Feynman didn't have time for pedanticism where it wasn't needed, and was an uncommonly intelligent man, and these two facts had nothing to do with each other.

Convention is a very handy thing, but the meaning can usually be guessed from context (there/their, you're/your), and if someone is speaking to you casually, or chatting online, or posting in a forum, the aim is surely to communicate, not write eloquent and elegant prose, or even full words. If you halt a conversation because, and to discuss the fact that, someone has offended your sense of aesthetics, you are a terrible conversationalist. People launch into histrionics like "That hurt my eyes to read" or personal attacks like "It's hard to take you seriously when you can't even run a spell-check [in this online discussion in which many people are posting balderdash as truth because they can't be bothered to check Google]" as though they hold the intellectual high-ground. As I said, regardless of what's technically correct (the best kind of correct), the degree to which someone's spelling error or use of txt spk bothers you is down to your own sense of aesthetics, and is no more high-minded than "Can you believe she thinks that top with that skirt?" Language is for communication, and clothes are for not being naked, and bad language and ugly clothes work just fine to those ends.

It seems particularly snobbish to jump down someone's throat for a mistake in English, which is an absolute mongrel language. (Fun grammar fact! When English was being standardised, the pluralisation of 'child' fell through some crack in the system and became a double plural.)

As I said, I am a sap for eloquence, which usually includes good grammar. By all means, correct your own grammar! Let your eye twitch when someone wants to talk about "there expereince"! But say anything about it (barring the caveats above), and you are being flat-out obnoxious.

* I find it really difficult to correct someone's grammar even when they've asked me to. I worked in a language school last Summer, and when I was chatting with the Spanish kids I found it difficult to fight the impulse to speak Spanish so that we could actually have a conversation, or to correct even the most enthusiastic students, even though they were paying to improve their grammar. It's just so abrasive in every other context!

House-keeping

My Social Justice League-type posts can now be found here. This blog will just be used for crafts and projects from here out.

I had thought of keeping all the posts in the one place - hobbies are a way of interacting with the world! educating yourself about how to treat people like people is a way of interacting with the world! - but I started this with a view to it being a crafts blog, and the other posts have been becoming more  frequent, and I just like to compartmentalise things.  Followers on that one would be lovely if that's your bag!

Thesis is due in six days, oh my.

Zoidberg understands me.

You know things are getting real when PubMed has edged out Facebook on my 'Most frequently visited' sites.  Makes me feel like a scientist though.  Boom.

I have been working on a commissioned pair of gloves for what feels like a million years.  They're nearly finished, and I'm looking forward to new projects (and thesis free time to work on them a bit more)!  My brother's 30th is on Thursday, so I'm going to make him this scarf.  (It will be late.  Thesis.  My excuse and reason for everything these days.)  I've loved it since I came across it, and was considering making one for myself, but as a geneticist I think he'll appreciate it.  Family of nerds.

Now, do basal receptors play a role in transducing mechanical signals and initiating intracellular responses?  LET'S FIND OUT!

I have seen seven or eight Missing Person posters since the start of the year.

As searches progress and leads peter out and it becomes more and more apparent that the person is probably not going to be found, I start hoping that they don't want to be found.  That this was their decision, that subjecting their family and friends to days and weeks of waiting and not knowing, never knowing, was a necessary evil for the sake of them escaping.  That they don't have to be afraid of whatever it was anymore, and that they can be free and happy.

I don't know if that's an optimistic or messed-up way of looking at it.  Certainly it's not the best case scenario so much as it is a different kind of tragedy.  This way one person comes out of it better, at least.

Came across this on a fashion blog.

When the Blackberry Market in Rathmines used to still exist, there was a old woman who had a stall that was just a room full of wool. It was packed to the ceiling and would spill out the door and you'd have to rummage deep within for whatever colour wool you were looking for. This was before knitting was cool again, though. Now you can get wool in little boutique shops in the Powerscourt Centre and isn't that what it's all about, really.

I could shout "Hipster!" at this a bunch of times, but... I've been knitting since the only places you could get yarn were Hickeys, Woollen Mills and that shop across from the Ilac Centre with sewing machines in the window.  I still love going into any of those shops.  I also love going into This Is Knit, the "little boutique shop in the Powerscourt Centre."  I'll spend twice as long as I need to, out of wanting to make everything out of everything.  This Is Knit is certainly fancier, and more indulgent, but there's no harm in that.  It seems strange that someone who's interested in high fashion, when Dunnes covers your body from the elements just as well, would complain about not-strictly-necessary self-indulgence in another field.

I could really go for a yarn-shopping day.

These should be mandatory.

There just isn't a word for how useful these are when you forget to put your circs back in the packet straight away.  Plus steel needles are kind of fancy.

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I'm probably going to vote for Michael D. Higgins on Thursday.  He seems dacent, and hasn't murdered anyone, which is always... the absolute baseline for giving someone power, not exactly a positive, but anyway.  In no way have I been influenced by this.

Words are tricky, except when they're not.

The internet's crush on Stephen Fry is perfectly understandable.  No-one, hive-minds included, shouldn't have a crush on Stephen Fry.  That said, I rather wish he hadn't said this.

I understand not caring that someone is 'offended' by gay couples existing right there in public, or by schools not being segregated, or by God being removed from the constitution (not that that's a concern in Ireland, ever.  And yet some people are concerned about the lack of Jesus in daily life!).  Like this woman.  This woman is a small person, and if I met her and she made me a cake and let me play with a puppy I wouldn't like her.  The problem is that in these cases, the word is being misappropriated, and thanks to this "I'm offended" has come to mean "I'm whining because the world isn't to my sensibilities, wah."

The word "offended" needs to exist, though, or there needs to be a word to replace it.  I know words change in meaning, but "I'm offended" is a nice, blame-shifting way of calling people out on thoughtless or plain abusive language or behaviour - an attack on their personhood, an offensive act in the "opposite of defence" sense of the word.  Needlessly thoughtful, actually, no-one says "I'm punched" after you give them a bloody nose.

The most bizarro thing is that even with the thoughtful "I" and shift in responsibility and use of a watered-down term, people go on the defensive if you suggest they've caused - performed - offense.  "I didn't mean actually retarded/I'm not racist/My gay friend laughed."  Good for you, knowing or blithely assuming that you're not a bigot.  Not everyone you meet knows that, and it's not their responsibility to give you the benefit of the doubt - you need to show it.  Not using dehumanising terms, or purely descriptive words as insults, is a bang-up start.  Otherwise, however cluelessly or unintentionally, you're attacking them.  Going on the offensive, one might say.  And then, through your actions and yours alone, they're attacked.  Offended, to use a slightly old sense of the word.

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My feminism will be intersectional or it will be bullshit.  I read the title of this post and thought "Wow I want to tattoo that on my face put that on some form of clothing," then I read the post itself, and felt sad and squirmy.

I'm not very fussy about labels.  If I find something that describes something I already feel like, I'll adopt that, but only because it sometimes saves on wordy descriptions.  I love learning, guess I'm a nerd.  I have girl parts, guess I'm a girl.  I like making things, guess I'm a craftster.  I believe people of all gender and sexual identities are equal, guess I'm a feminist.

The feminism one has always been a little inconvenient because it's a subset of what I believe about equality.  I also believe people of all skin colours, all physical and mental capabilities, all classes are equal.  Everyone is people, all the time!  These things aren't strictly covered by the term "feminist".  But my first feminist blog was Fugitivus)which discusses feminism, race and class - perhaps more extreme than I am now, but I have a fondness for the blog and author, though sadly it seems to have fallen out of use) which led me to my first anti-racism blog ,Stuff White People Do (mainly race-based but has some elements of feminism, as WoC get it from both directions - again, no longer updated but remembered with fondness), where I came across Womanist Musings (race, gender and sexual identity, class, religion, most aspects of social justice, really).  I don't know if I'm bad at logic and assumed people who used the same label as me felt the same as me, but or if the route I took to this section of the internet led me to believe so, but I always assumed that 'feminist' really meant 'social justice-ist, including feminist'.  You don't have to act on all the issues ever, but how can you care about one and not at least see the rest to be wrong.  Then stuff like this happens:

and some people actually defend it and try to call it a feminist act.  So maybe I need a new word.

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My little brother, who has just started studying in the same college as me, texted me today to ask if he could come heat up some food in my microwave.  When he got here, he had milk, tea, biscuits (two packets as he didn't know what kind I like), and two packets of pasta.  It made me feel all fuzzy inside.  Nice things happen too!

This sentiment needs to die a death.

There's been a good deal said about the Nice Guy™ Complex.  I don't have anything new to bring to the table.  But holy God is it annoying.

Aside from the creepy self-entitled skeeziness of the attitude, here's what gets me: I will not give you brownie points for being nice to me.  I expect you to be nice to me.  Not to go out of your way, but yeah, hold the door if I'm right behind you, and feel kind of bad for me if I'm having a crummy week, and not tune out if I talk about hobbies we don't share.  This doesn't make us friends - this is what I expect from acquaintances.  If you dislike me, I expect you to avoid me, and I'll do the same for you, and we won't rub each other up the wrong way.  This doesn't make us friends - this is what I expect from acquaintances.

When I say I expect this, I don't mean to say that someone can fail to live up to my standards and fall in my esteem - this is my experience of how the world works, so it's kind of conspicuous by its absence.  It's what the reasonable people have done so far in my life, so for as long as these things remain pretty unchanged, it's what I'm going to expect from future reasonable people.

I don't understand if Nice Guy™s have never had any friends, or if they've only had guy friends and their are different rules for girls because boobs.  If you are my friend, of course I'm going to care and try to make you feel better if you're upset.  If it's your birthday I'm buying or making you food, because food is how I show affection.  If I can help you out I will, with varying degrees of inconvenience to myself depending on how close we are.  None of this should be read as an indication that I am attracted to you.

The Nice Guy™ Complex comes with a sneery attitude that women (all three billion!  Each and every one!) don't know what they want.  They say they want someone who's nice or funny, but then how come they don't settle down with the first nice, funny guy they meet?  Why do they go out with anyone with whom they might occasionally argue, as people will do in relationships?  They're shallow is why, they're just waiting for someone rich and handsome.  It doesn't seem to register that when, people are listing their ideal person, "and whom I find attractive" is implied.  The people I'm friends with and the people I get a crushes on can probably be described in similar terms, because that's the type of person I enjoy being around - the difference is that some will make me feel all fuzzy in my tummy, for reasons I can't define.  Girls are such harpies, having subjective tastes that you can't control.

What Nice Guys don't seem to understand is that they're cock-blocking themselves.  If you resent someone for not sleeping with you after you totally empathised when their cat died, they can tell.  Women in particular might be a little more tuned in to this because we're conditioned to be nice without leading anyone on.  I don't mean this in some nonsense PUA Roissy "Women can tell when you're interested and once they know you have lost!" way.  I'm far too socially oblivious to know when someone likes me - I didn't realise my first date with my boyfriend was a date, and when my ex asked me out I thought he was making small talk.  I'm not too clueless to realise when someone is viewing me as parts, as a girl before a person.  It makes me uncomfortable, even if it's not sleazy (old-boy professors who distinguish between women and people, anyone?), and  it makes me not want to be around you.  And it's really hard to sleep with someone who won't be around you.

And anyway, the fact of getting annoyed about having another friend is a bonus layer of creepy.  Why can't you be like these nice folks?

And now an advertising break!

Fourth year is hard!  And I am only two weeks in and haven't even had time for assignment to accrue or mod project lab work to start.  (Proposal's not due until November, but I'll be starting work before then, because proposals are a wacky formality worth ten percent of my project.  Or maybe it was fifteen.)  I have disappointing little time to knit, and I don't have my sewing machine in college, so it will probably take me approximately a million years to finish anything.  This means posts will be either sporadic or wordy.

So I am going to share a cool thing with you, internet!  There is a great shop in Temple Bar which used to be called Sé Sí, and still has that sign on the outside.  On the inside it's called Mayfly, and it's just great.  They sell handmade things by various designers, and, by the sounds of it, are very open to stocking makings by anyone who's interested, and has some unspecified standard.  It's like Etsy, in real life.  They also operate a barter system, so you can pay for goods in IT help, or any other useful skill you may have to offer.  It's kitschy and retro, but not in a pretentious or affected way.  They have pin-up brooches on playing card price tags, jewellery made out of scrabble and jigsaw pieces, cloche hats and fascinators, redecorated old shoes (I meant to look that woman up actually, I would buy boring new shoes to have her fancy them up), cuff-links made from compasses and type-writer kets, and lots of unusual pieces that make it an uncommonly pleasant place to have a wander when you have the time.  I got a lovely steampunky necklace there last week, but unfortunately I left it in college so I can't take a picture.  I'm always willing to pay a little more for something handmade, because I like to support people who are working on their own craft, but everything in there is very reasonably priced, so you get to supports craftsters and not spend lavishly!

They don't seem to have a website, but here's a Facebook page.  Do go in, they're nice people.

Stephen Moffat, you let me down.

Spoilers!  Spoilers if you watch Doctor Who!  Spoilers!

I was disappointed with the series finale last night.  So disappointed that I had to write a blog post about it.  How they wiggled out of the Doctor dying was very literally a deus ex machina move, and... I expected more.  There was always going to be a twist, but it felt very contrived and sloppy.

The biggest disappointment for me, though, was River Song.  River has been a mystery since the Library episodes, the more so because she's such a great character.  Amy is the Hot Sidekick (I mean, she's a great character, but she'd be a different one if she spoke the same lines while overweight with bad skin), but River is sexy without being a slim twenty-something - more than that, she's seductive, rather than just standing there bein' sexy.  She's confident and clever and strong.  She does her own saving the day, and has her own adventures, and is a match for the Doctor.  The probably-love-story arc is compelling too, because the more you see of her character the more tragic it becomes that they're moving in opposite directions, and she has get older knowing that he's going to forget her and their presumed love.  (It's kind of like The Time Traveller's Wife, but with characters and a plot.)  I thought her rapid turn-around in Let's Kill Hitler was a little clunky, but I could forgive it since they were pressed for time.  I didn't like that in The Wedding of River Song she was in love with the Doctor after one meeting and a few years of research.  It's entirely uncharacteristic with strong, self-sufficient River.  And the marriage for the sake of saving the world, when he still doesn't know her, and she doesn't know him at all... It wasn't the grand romance they'd been building up to.

After a little over two seasons, and who is River Song?  She's a kid with a crush.  Hopefully the next season has the older version of her, rather than the moony-eyed one.

I did like Amy killing Kovarian though.  One of my main complaints in the second half of the season is that Amy and Rory didn't seem too fussed about having lost their baby.  They always knew she grew up to be River, and it was treated as though it was somehow alright after Let's Kill Hitler because they had grown up alongside her (did she get fostered?  Do not understand.) when none of that changed the fact that their baby had been stolen from them.  I understand that to be the kind of thing to which parents don't take kindly, and that storyline just vanished.

That said, I can respect a man who can spend a whole season building up to a pun.

EDIT: Another thing I liked: "Die a final time, and know that she will never return for you." Oh yes she will. 

Self-knowledge is important.

According to a guy named for a Carebear or something, I am a lesser beta male or a greater beta female.

You heard it here first.

I could paste every single line from both quizzes and say why it's wrong, but my favourite is this:

"The scoring of female BMI varies somewhat from that of male BMI because aesthetics, not just general health, have to be taken into consideration."

MRA-heads just want to be loved really.

Cut off all my hair again!

I'm leaving for a month in the Amazon rainforest on Wednesday (my life is a pretty great life), and I didn't want my hair to be on my neck or in my eyes or generally annoying.

I hold my hands up as a nervous thing without realising, but this was the best photo.

The fringe is silly-looking, so that it will have grown back in by the time I'm home but not be annoying while I'm there.  I think I'll like it better once the fringe has grown in, though I'm happy enough with it now.  I'm moderately confident I could pull off drag.  It's short enough to make it spiky, too!  Though not for very long, my hair is very thick and gravity is a potent force.  Also, when I was looking for hair gel, all the products in the "Hair" aisle where for taming frizz and maximising volume (I already have giant hair, and it will take more than some puny spray to not have it go everywhere), but no hair gel.  There wasn't a "Men's hair" aisle, so I went on a hunt, and eventually found it in the "Men's toiletries" section.  I guess this says something about gender roles, but mostly it's a little baffling.  Toiletries are shower products and soap and bathroom things.  Hair gel is for hair that is already dry because you've already showered.  Also it is not a necessity for polite society.  This could just be me being "HOW DO I HAIR" but there was an aisle for hair products, and I don't understand why you'd hide in in a different aisle!

My poor scaffold got caught by the comb a lot though.  Not ideal.