Feb. 6th, 2015

brushwolf: Icon created by ScaperDeage on DeviantArt (Default)
1. So I grew up in Georgia and somehow managed to miss many of that state's redeeming features.

The Indigo Girls met and started playing music at the Decatur high school I passed on my way to ride MARTA in to get to Sword of the Phoenix; REM and the B-52s were I guess too edgy and Queer-positive for anyone in my high school to like, and my father's taste in music (classical and some jazz and folk rock) dominated everything at home; I never got to explore Five Points; down the way from me, some guys who were all afire to completely revamp how we saw roleplaying games (to be fair, they did a lot) started a gaming company called White Wolf.

Eventually I graduated high school and went to The University of Michigan. At the time, forging exotic out of state drivers' licenses was a quick way for underage students to get alcohol, so out of state students were instantly popular to talk to. The two questions I got most frequently were "where's your accent?" (my parents are New Yorkers, and my accent is some weird hybrid of Brooklyn/rural Georgia/metro Atlanta which sounded pretty midwestern even before I lived in Michigan for a while) and "do you like REM?" I'd be anxious to appease people and so I'd say yes to that second question.

This meant that when I started investigating pop music, REM was one of the first bands I wanted to try listening to, and of course since they were REM, they totally blew my mind.

2. These days I actually love playing the cleric. Clerics have awesome role-playing hooks as part of their religions, and when you're the cleric, the default action of healing allies starts out great - then you get to have some cool other spells, and you can still wade into combat or snipe from a distance in a way arcane classes can't.

When I was fresh out of Georgia, though, cleric was the role nobody wanted. This is enough editions of D&D ago that fighter classes and thieves got to do the exciting chunky damage, druids had limited healing abilities, bards weren't a viable option for someone who wanted to play with other personalities and abilities and still do healing, and you couldn't just buy up Wands of Cure Light.

I was also trying to be A Good Jewish Boy, because that's what my parents insisted and I hadn't thought to try anything else yet, which meant on Friday nights I'd trundle to Hillel and daven and walk back to the dorm. As the days grew shorter and Shabbas services started earlier, I'd start getting back in time to play D&D - but not quite back early enough to stake out the exciting ranger/thief/whatever roles. I got to be cleric a lot, ironically as a result of being religious.

3. I actually have had that quintessential Old Guy experience, Walking Uphill to School During a Blizzard. Here's how it happened;

As the inclement weather warnings rolled in, the University administration was in one of its periodic pissing matches with the TA union. The union's take on it was that no way were their TAs showing up to class and the administration ordered that there was going to be class those days, no matter what. So I walked from my spot off campus, uphill to class and man, it was cold and huh, that's a lot of snow and not a lot of visibility, but winters down south do not feature blizzards and I figured it was some sort of Michigan thing. It probably does it all the time here, right? By the time I got back from nearly empty classrooms and even more snow I found out that's what I'd been in, a blizzard.
brushwolf: Icon created by ScaperDeage on DeviantArt (Default)
Clearly, this is where in this Juno Reactor track where all the Cirque guys start rolling around in burning hoops around that dude's bed...

... or it's the part of the movie where, like, that dude is all SO MISTER ANDERSON and then like Keanu is all WHOA and fights him.

And then like Trinity is like whoa you said like never take 980 North during rush hour and Morpheus is all YEAH BUT THE EL CERRITO RANCH 99.

See this is the part of Matrix Reloaded where things flip over in slow motion. So like 50% of the movie. #JunoReactor #MonaLisaOverdrive

Whoa. 1) I didn't realize Wales had her own national anthem and 2) I didn't realize that it's possibly the schmalziest national anthem ever.

This has me listening to national anthems. Finland; a lot like what you'd expect Japan's anthem to be like. Japan; surprisingly not catchy.

Brazilian national anthem; surprisingly operatic, very pleasant. Kenya; uninspiring musically, kiSwahili lyrics are nice.

Sweden; like what the Deutschlandlied would be like with naturalism instead of nationalism.

Norway; pretty nice, sounds much more like a Russian song than expected, also amazed it isn't a huge dig at Swedes.

And, admittedly I was going in biased, but I love Mongolia's national anthem, lyrics and tune alike.

#MakeAFilmUncomfortable you mean other than My Big Fat Greek Wedding and nearly everything Woody Allen ever made?

#MakeAFilmUncomfortable you mean other than the people wolfing down the giant bucket-o-popcorn last/only time I saw Schindler's List?

#MakeAFilmUncomfortable you mean other than Jodorowsky talking about how he had to "rape the bride" during #JodorowskysDune?

[M] @Brushwolf Uh. What? o.o

@[M] Have you seen it yet? It's an great film about the greatest film never made & an inspiring story of why comics are great, BUT...

@[M] There's a part where he's talking about how a director can't leave a story untouched, but has to get in and apply his vision.

@[M] And the particular metaphor he chooses is the story's like a bride on her wedding night thus he has to rape the bride. *squirms*

[M] @Brushwolf just...why

[M] @Brushwolf I haven't. I'd like to, tho I take it as an article of faith that "El Topo" Jodorowski would've gotten it even wronger than Lynch

@[M] Oh wow. Watch it if you can. It would've been a TERRIBLE movie but people (myself included) would have completely fallen for it.

[M] @Brushwolf Yeah, I must see this :) I like stories of films that never were.

@[M] This is sorta a serious version of Mel Brooks' Silent Movie; recruiting brilliant artists & wacky celebs for a far out project.

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