Twisted Spinster

A human fat-powered car.

(Via Tim Blair.)

Someone else is having trouble with all those “Nazis are people too” movies being put out by the culturally-bankrupt, dead-souled film industry. Here’s an article in the UK Times about the phenomenon:

A spectre is haunting Europe. It wears jackboots, a swastika and a delicate tear-stained expression of angst-ridden introspection.

Read the whole thing. I’m glad I’m not the only one who thinks we already “understand” the Nazis quite enough, thank you, and that there isn’t any particular reasons to hunt among them for sympathetic characters. Believe it or not, there were some good guys fighting the Nazis back in the day who weren’t fellow Nazis! No really. Look it up.

(Via The Macho Response.)

Sorry, can’t think of an interesting post title. I made the mistake of going to the store today. Well, it wasn’t a mistake, I absolutely had to go because all I had left in the fridge was bread, one slice of cheese, and half an onion. Since I live next to a large mall and everywhere I have to go means I have to go near or past this mall I encountered this ridiculous traffic. I managed to get all my shopping done without killing anyone, but by the time I got home I was beat.

Anyway, I think Squeaky is getting better because she sure has been cranky and feisty all day. She is still very weak but when she went to the litter box today she didn’t have to rest three times. And this time she didn’t hang her butt outside the box and pee on the floor, though she did step in the pee so I had to clean the wet litter off her feet while she growled and wriggled. She was pissed at me after this morning’s fluid session, and in fact she fussed so much I could only give her half her fluid. I called the vet and he said to try to give her fluid every day but if she fusses so much then every other day is fine. Well I’d be mad if someone shoved a long needle (it’s like two inches long and it isn’t very thin) under their skin every day. Anyway, I hope this feistiness means she’s getting stronger.

I want to thank everyone for their donations. They are really helping. If I can’t find a cheaper source for my cat’s fluid bags I’m going to be paying almost thirty dollars a pop every one or two weeks, and I don’t know how I’m going to manage that. Well I can eat less.

One more thing. Xena turned up her nose at her portion of the prescription food (I figured that to keep Squeaky from eating food she wasn’t supposed to I’d just feed them both the prescription food), so I’m not going to give her anymore. Squeaky won’t eat it on her own yet, and it’s too expensive to let dry up on a plate on the floor. Xena can go back to just eating dry food, the way she used to.

[Added: see the bottom of the post for the greatest thing ever.]

Yeah, I haven’t written one of these in a while. Anyway… I figured out the main thing that is wrong with the new Doctor Who series (that is, the revival which started in 2005 with Christopher Eccleston playing Doctor No. 9, and continued with David Tennant as No. 10). And that is: it’s not so much about this iconic British character of an alien time traveller who has weird adventures along with human or otherwise companions, as it is about how wonderful it is about being a fan of Doctor Who.

Not being British, I missed out on all the cultic thrill of being a fan of the show. Of course it was one of my favorite shows but it was one of those things that used to only be shown on PBS stations on this side of the pond. Before cable tv PBS pretty much had foreign tv sewn up; they were just about the only source of British shows like Monty Python, Masterpiece Theater, and so on. The schedule was more reliable, as was their funding source. But as cable took hold in the 80s, PBS began to lose its foothold as the only source of foreign tv, and I think their budget shrank, and they stopped showing anything that anyone over the age of 75 was interested in, so my last Doctor for a while was the 5th, Peter Davison. (My first was Tom Baker, number 4. I knew no other Doctors and until recently there could be no other Doctors before those two.) I remember when the tv movie came out, an abortive attempt by Fox to revive the series that went nowhere. I missed it for a reason I now forget. A friend saw it, and said it was “eh.” She hadn’t taped it, or else I’d have seen it. Anyway, I’ve never seen the tv movie with Doctor 8, Paul McGann, though I believe it’s the source of the Evil Overlord rule: “I will not turn into a snake. It never helps.”

Anyway, I heard of the revival, but wasn’t interested, so I missed the Christopher Eccleston run when it first came out. I didn’t get into the new series until it was well into it’s third year over here. Let’s just say I’ve caught up.

I decided to look up the guy who brought it back to life, Russell T. Davies. The first thing I discovered was he was the brain behind Queer As Folk, and that he was one of what I call “professional gays.” A light went off in my head, and a little voice said “so that’s it.”

I’ve been into music fandom before. Scifi cultism is kind of like that. You think you’re special because you listen to this weird music or read these weird stories that other people flinch and frown at, and that music or those stories say something to you that you can’t get from what other people, who you soon learn to call “normals” or “mundanes” or something like that — something that marks you out as special and separate from them — listen to or read. You try to explain your liking to the normals at first, but they just give you that look, and you soon learn to keep it to yourself, so you won’t lose the specialness. The threat that you’ll wake up one day and agree with “them” — the normal, average crowd — that your special, exalted, “other” thing, isn’t really all that special, it’s a variation of something everyday, or worse, it’s an inversion of something good and true, an inversion that is a mockery, and that up against the good and true looks false, stupid, and tinny. The threat of laughter and mockery always looms for the cult fan.

That being said, the strengths of the Doctor Who “brand” didn’t used to depend upon the exclusiveness and clannishness of its fans, but on the common roots of the base story itself, which was the age-old tale of the travelling adventurer. The new series is in a sense inverted. Excellent as much of it is (there is certainly better acting, pacing, and special effects than the old low-budget show), it’s become not so much about the wonderful and mysterious character of the Doctor and all the scrapes he and his random buddies get into as it is about how wonderful it is that we fans are into this Doctor character and show.

The most glaring example of this is the way the writers, led by Davies, decided to get rid of all the Time Lords and their planet Gallifrey in an immense yet never-clearly-explained war. Foom! They’re gone. It wasn’t enough that the Doctor was a rootless wanderer more or less exiled from his home for reasons unknown — let’s up the stakes and make him totally homeless. Which makes him totally dependent upon humans in the minds of the new writers, or am I the only one that has noticed that? Not to mention, having cleared the path, so to speak, of those “high tech” Time Lords, I observe that the human race in this series certainly seems to have out-marveled that old alien race when it comes to tech wonders. Consider: the humans live until the very end of the universe (Utopia/The Sound of Drums/Last of the Time Lords), can instantly terraform a planet (The Doctor’s Daughter), are able to transform an entire planet into a giant library just for one dying girl (Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead), can live on as a flap of skin with a brain in a tank (Rose and New Earth), and so on. How can the Time Lords compete? Heck, humans even get time travel. (The character of Captain Jack used to be a Time Agent; and he travels in time without being protected by a Tardis — hardcore!)

Humans are elevated into the main characters in the new series, which throws the whole thing off just a tad. Just enough to irritate anal-retentive people with time on their hands (heh) like me. Maybe that’s why the best episode of the whole three years was “Midnight,” which had the Doctor all by himself without his companion and her superpowers of friendship to protect him. Of course, that episode ended with him having to be rescued from his predicament by a human anyway. Humans — that is fans — rule! Note: an episode of Queer As Folk reportedly had one of the main characters after an abortive date with another guy retreating to the safety of his hidden stash of Doctor Who episodes. See? Hidden away like a closeted gay’s real life! Did Russell T. Davies forget to mention that he’s gay? And a Doctor Who fan? Write it down, there will be a quiz.

I’ll skip over all the tedious lessons on “tolerance” that the new series writers’ seem to feel today’s audience needs at least one of in every episode. I also don’t want to give the impression that I don’t enjoy the show. I wouldn’t write about it like this if I didn’t. I wouldn’t watch it. But I hope that next year, with a new executive producer in charge, that we start to ease up on the fannishness and get back into the actual story. They have this fascinating character of an alien time traveller and he’s been made into just another love object for girls and boys to sigh over. At the end of the day, that’s not really all that interesting. (Nor is the — God spare us — underlying theme of “all war is bad” that I think is behind the whole Time War I-destroyed-Gallifrey-in-order-to-save-it thing. If I were in charge I’d pull some Whoniverse trick out of my ass forthwith and bring back Gallifrey and at least some of the Time Lords. I don’t have the trouble with the idea of authority that apparently certain writers at the BBC do…)

I’ll end with a short review of the last Doctor Who episode I’ve watched. “The Infinite Quest” is an animated episode featuring Martha and the Doctor. I won’t say it’s better than any of the regular live-action episodes, but… I enjoyed it a whole lot more than even some of my favorite of the other episodes. The plot is a foofaraw of nonsense that reminded me of the fun days of the old series, something about tracking down a many-parted device that can do something universe-shattering in order to keep it from the dastardly villain who wants it. Martha’s family is not mentioned. (Each regular companion except for Jack has a family in the new series, and despite a cute moment or two it’s unbelievably tedious. Oh, the many moments of plot wasted while Rose wittered on about her dead dad or way-too-living mum, or Martha lied to her mother, or Donna belatedly realized that “that’s my family down there!” on Earth. The old series had it right — make sure the companions are orphans or if they do have family — in the case of Turlough — or start moaning about wanting settled family life — like Susan — get those companions off the series as soon as possible. I’m so sick of families mucking up my entertainment.) Anyway, the episode is a throwback to the old fun episodes where it was just the Doctor and his mate trying to stop something bad or find something and along the way they visit some alien planets that aren’t frikkin’ 21st century Earth. I quite liked it. The only thing I didn’t like was the animation — it was okay for backgrounds, alien creatures, and robotic characters, but human and humanoids like the Doctor were primitively drawn, without even the life that Hanna Barbera characters had. But the regular actors (along with Anthony Head voicing the main villain) read out the lines, so I really didn’t have to actually watch the thing, I could pretend I was listening on the radio. Now I am wondering if the radio plays are more like this instead of being like the television show. I’ll have to look them up.

Update: this is the greatest thing I have ever seen in my life. Next year I’m making one. Ooh, but I’ll use a silver Christmas tree. Or even a gold one, if I can find one…

Second update: I’m so not used to the cradle-to-grave-care attitude of the British that this only occurred to me now — how odd is is that this show is considered some sort of cult classic in the land of its origin? I mean: it’s a government sponsored show (it’s always been on the BBC) and considered a British cultural institution. Not only that, it’s a “family” show (i.e., one people of all ages can watch, the ideal being Mum, Dad, and the kids all huddled together on the couch). But even in the UK its fans seem to think of themselves as members of some sort of special group quite out of the mainstream of British society. That’s just fucked up.

Um, didn’t we have that whole Revolutionary War thing so we wouldn’t have to be governed by people who thought like this anymore? At least, that’s what I learned in school.

Another thought: what makes these people think the Kennedys have “good political genes”? It could be just as likely that they have good rum runner genes. Or considering how many of them have come to untimely, violent deaths, maybe they have good death-by-misadventure genes.

Democrats, thinking for the ignorant masses like good overlords should. I can’t wait to be issued my very own begging bowl so that when the Great Ones pass by in their motorcades I can catch some of the used latte cups and croissant-ends they toss out the windows, so I can make my humble supper.

(Via.)

Added: FWIW, here is the comment I left in Rand’s site, addressed to one of his regular, Bush-obsessed (as in BDS) trolls:

…[T]he issue… isn’t whether people should go into the same profession that other members of their family are in, the issue is the ridiculous fawning over the Kennedys and the supposed “speshulness” of their genetic makeup as concerns politics. This is coming from the Democrats, who claim to be the friends of the common man. It’s the Republicans who are supposed to be the party of exclusionary rich fat cats who don’t want any riffraff getting into power. But NO Republican spokesperson of any importance (in which I am not including some fool saying some Bush offspring is “our John John”) has made any claim whatsoever that the Bush family or any other political family has special political superpowers running through its genetic makeup — in fact, Republicans are in general (at least those who are still conservative) quite wary about basing things on genetics.

No, come on, think about it mentally. We have the “party of the Peepul” and its lackeys in the media licking the floor in delight at the idea of Yet Another Kennedy in a key political position, based solely on the fact that this person is a relative of St. JFK. Gee, you know, I’m sorry John F. and then Robert got shot and all, but that doesn’t invalidate the fact that over two hundred years ago we had a frikken’ war to get out from under the divine right of kings.

And it has nothing to do with the Bushes, that’s just your obsession and your attempt to divert the comment thread here onto it. Most people I know who voted for Dubya did so despite his relationship to the first Bush, not because of it. There is nothing like the weird “Camelot” glamour myth about the Bushes. In fact, most people I know are uneasy that so many in the Bush family are in politics. We don’t automatically drop to our knees in star-struck admiration of celebrities and their families like too many liberals do. I’m sick of the Kennedys; the whole “American royalty” treatment they’ve gotten has always struck me as essentially un-American.

The troll, if you care to read his comments, has been trying to claim that there is a similar level of adulation among Republicans over the Bushes and some other “neocon” families who all happen to go into more or less the same career. The thing is, as I said, that’s not even the issue under discussion. Does someone saying something similar about some other family at all invalidate arguments against this elevation of the Kennedys to entitled status? Even if there is a contingent of Republicans who think that the presidency should be the exclusive possession of the Bush family (and I am aware of exactly zero Republicans who think that way), that doesn’t make the idea behind it — that families who are famous for all or most of its members going into politics means they are “destined” to do so by genetics or any other factor — right.

Well, I just completed my first successful feline subcutaneous fluid administration. I only managed to spill a little of the solution all over the place, and didn’t have to poke more than five holes in the poor cat. I felt weird setting up the rig, like I was performing illicit scientific experiments on my cat, but she didn’t even flinch when I poked her, and she lay mostly still while it was dripping. However, once the dose was done and the needle removed, Squeaky retired to sit under the table where I have my cable box. She’s curled up on the cable wires right now. Attempts to make her more “comfortable” (that is, get her off my coaxials) met with growls. I don’t think she liked being a pincushion. Well, the vet advised me to give her some every day for a week, so she’d better get used to it. I screwed a cup hook into the wall above where she likes to sleep and hung the solution bag from it.

Well the shops are crowded and traffic is crazy! That’s my excuse, anyway.

Oh, snap. Jeremy Irons is my new celebrity hero. He’s tired of the “smutty, shower room nonsense” on British radio and tv. I want to quote everything but I’ll restrict myself to this:

“It doesn’t mean it all has to be middle-class, shire-orientated behaviour. But good manners and kindness are what hold our society together. And I would think that broadcasting would try and convey that. If we don’t have respect for each other then everything breaks down.”

I keep saying. You all know we have the same problem over here and I’ve been complaining off and on about it for years. But people keep going to movies like Limbs Ripped Off Nubile Models In Slo-Mo XIV and watching “reality tv” shows like Drug Addicts Rolling Around In Their Own Vomit. I don’t get it. (By the way, the fact that they still have plays and things on the radio in the UK is just hilarious to me. Don’t they know that radio is for nasty deejays talking about doing jello shots out of Britney Spears’ ass crack? Not Shakespeare and all that sort of thing. Well, we do have National Public Radio, but nobody listens to that but old hippies.)

Okay, cat update: she got tired of lying on the damp mulch and went back inside to sleep for hours under the table where I have my cable box. I woke her up to poke a little food in her mouth, which irritated her so much she moved back to her pillow, which is now next to the utility closet. Xena is a nervous wreck about the whole thing — I think Squeaky must smell different from being sick and all, because Xena is acting like I’ve brought a whole new cat home. She’s been smelling the places where Squeaky has been, and then going up to Squeaky and hissing at her. And Xena has also been barfing all over the rug. And the one time she doesn’t barf on the rug, she barfs on my Ikea catalogue. Think she’s trying to tell me something? (Yeah, like don’t keep anything you don’t want the cat to barf on on the floor.)

Tomorrow morning I go to pick up the fluids and stuff for the cat. I’m still having the fundraiser — thanks to all who have donated so far. Every little bit helps.

This is not actually a slam against capitalists, just self-proclaimed ones who are to the free market what mold is to drywall. Ones like “Tatyana,” commenting on this post about a neglectful landlord who let the apartment buildings he owned fall to pieces. The residents have to move out, because the buildings have been condemned. A fairly straightforward account of what happens when you bite off more than  you can chew (the buildings are being foreclosed on) and the fallout therefrom, right? Not to this Tatyana, who trumpeted that the owner “had the right to take a loss” on the buildings, that he was not obligated to do more for his renters than what was in their lease agreements, that renters want apartment owners to be their “nannies,” and that it was unfair for the evil “state” to make apartment building owners adhere to building maintenance codes or any kind of standard whatsoever except what he, and a free, Ayn-Randian non-altruistic man, valued and felt like adhering to. Well, all I can say is John Galt would have slapped the apartment owner’s face, but not all of us are John Galt — many of us want to get as much as we can grab for the least possible effort. That’s why we have community standards, building codes, all sorts of things that freewheeling pretend capitalists (who are actually looters in disguise — yes, I’ve read the books, I know what I’m talking about, you feel no obligation to tell the truth about what you are selling, it’s all on the buyer’s shoulders and if he’s so stupid as to give you money without spending hours and hours of research and detective work to find out if the apartment he wants to rent is up to code then so what you have his money. Sucker!)

No really, it’s not that difficult: people rent so they won’t have to do certain things, like replace bad wiring, moldy drywall, and corroded plumbing. That’s why they pay security deposits and why renting is more expensive than owning (if not in the actual monthly payment then over the long run since you aren’t building up good credit and the money you put into rent won’t result in you owning anything after a set number of years). And in fact, renters are not allowed to do such things to their property — I’m not even allowed to paint the walls (well, I can, but I have to repaint them the original color before I move or I’ll lose part or all of my security deposit) or change out the hideous white plastic blinds for something more attractive. I accept those restrictions for the freedom not having to unclog my sink myself or fix my broken a/c at my own expense.

And people who live in a community together, like a city or a state, accept that there are certain base standards to adhere to, because without them human nature runs wild and everything goes to shit. Think of all those stories about that one house in the neighborhood where the yards are unkempt and full of trash, rats and other vermin run wild, the stench from the house (which is full of cats, dogs, and their uncleaned-up feces and piss) fills the air for blocks. In Tatyana’s world the community should not be allowed to force the owner to clean up. In Tatyana’s world there are magical barriers to vermin and bad smells making those things respect property lines. Tatyana states that she comes from the former Soviet Union, and uses that as her excuse to never let any state tell her what to do or something. She’s got it sideways: she does not seem to realize that it’s not the community rules that are bad; that depends upon the way they are imposed. In the former USSR, they were imposed from the top down, based on some far away report by some faceless commitee, and therefore not respected and thus not adhered to all that much — hence the crappy living conditions in communist countries. Here in the USA, community standards are set by the people who live in those communities. If Tatyana feels alienated from where she lives here in the US, and thinks that there are rules and regulations she finds too restricting and onerous for her liking, she’s under no obligation to live here — she is free to leave, for some place that suits her better.

One final thing: I think much of her cynical and distrustful outlook is due to her upbringing in the cynical and distrustful atmosphere in the former Soviet Union, a place where little natural community feeling was apparently fostered, and where apparently this sort of attitude (by all report) continues to hold sway and hold Russia et al back. That just goes to show how living under communism damages, not just the people living under it, but future generations who have supposedly broken “free.” Freedom takes trust. If you can’t trust the people you are living among to a certain level, you’re screwed.

Good morning, yawl. Squeaky is a tiny bit stronger — I fed her her thyroid pill and spooned some food into her mouth, and after she recovered from that shock she got up from her pillow and made her way slowly out to the patio. Xena was not pleased that her turf was invaded by the evil other cat, so she stood there hissing until I made her go inside. Play nice or pay the penalty! Squeaky is now sitting outside on the damp mulch in my mulch bed (which I would prefer to replace with sand or rocks like some other people in the complex have done with theirs — the mulch just gets wet and grows mushrooms) — I guess it makes her think of her days when she lived outside. I think she’s walking so slowly because her kidney area is sore; hopefully when I start her on fluids she’ll start to feel better. But at least she’s taking an interest in things.

It’s their version of Santa handing out sacks of coal and bundles of sticks for all the bad kids: among the movies being released on Christmas Day for the relatively new (well, we didn’t do it when I was a kid) American custom of going to the movies on Christmas is a movie about a possibly kiddie-diddling priest and the unpleasant nun (or whatever she is) that tries to catch him out, Doubt. By the way, the “doubt” of the title doesn’t seem to be the attitide of either of the main characters — the priest, played by Phillip Seymour Hoffman, and the nun, played by Meryl Streep, or at least that’s how it looks in the trailer. According to the plot synopsis on IMDB, the “doubt” is what all the other characters are supposed to be feeling towards the nun, but if you ask me the “doubt” really means what the people running the film industry want Catholics to feel towards their church, and by proxy all Christians to feel towards their beliefs.

Which brings me to my point: this is being released on Christmas, and I can’t think of a nastier “take that!” to give to people trying to celebrate Christmas for reasons other than getting gifts and going to parties. I guess this is Hollywood’s revenge for having to adhere to the Hays Code for so long. I wonder if anyone has even read it — seeing the complete list of everything banned makes me realize why movies of yesterday, even the so-called “B” pictures, seem to be so much better than most big blockbusters of the today: filmmakers, prevented from filler such as lengthy sex scenes or detailed depictions of criminal activity meant they had to actually be creative in their plotting and scene settings, and not being allowed to salt the script with numerous “fucks” and “shits” meant they had to write interesting dialogue. Really, read the whole thing. You’ll cry. I can’t imagine a single thing the code lists that is actually necessary to any truly good story. And don’t most movies these days consist of every single thing listed therein, except maybe (and I’m not sure since I don’t watch those “art” films) exposing childrens’ sex organs?

Oh well, gotta break a few eggs to make an avant-garde mess on the floor that you can install in the Tate and call art! Some other uplifting treasures being released over the holidays: Seven Pounds, another black-man-as-Christ flick (with Will Smith doing the crying and suffering; you know, with those ears of his he is starting to resemble our new prez, which can only be to the good of his career); The Wrestler, with Mickey Rourke playing yet another part where he gets to beat someone up and be sweaty; Nothing But the Truth, about a Crusading Journalist up against the dastardly US government; Milk, which is not about what does a body good, but which is about a guy who used to do other guys’ bodies and who became famous for getting shot to death in San Francisco; Revolutionary Road, which is about how the Fifties sucked and was boring but especially so for cute married couples played by Leonardo Di Caprio and Kate Winslet (yes, the Titanic pair are together again in what sounds like another sinker); Valkyrie — rebellious Nazis led by Tom Cruise in an eye patch don’t manage to kill Hitler. I call it “Reepicheep in Risky Business 2.”