Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Evil Calculators to Strip Searches to Baby Days - Reminiscent of Gorey, But Not Gory! Also more Casablanca references!!

In my wanderings last night, I spent a moment with Lisa at That's Why.
That\
She lists her location as "O'Possum's Drift, Midbartow, Georgia, United States." I had my doubts that this is a real place; however, she announced she's moved to Euharlee, which is a real place. Lisa is funny and writes with a wonderful strong voice. She attracts only the best people as followers. I was curious about my fellow followers, so I checked out a few of their places.



Randal Graves sounded like my kind of smart aleck. His blog is L'ennui mélodieux, which Babelfish informs us means l' melodieux trouble. Thanks a lot, Babelfish. I always thought ennui meant boredom. I bet it means melodious trouble. Or melodious boredom. I could ask him, but that would be too easy. His posts are very interesting and frequently hilarious, although often more clever than I'm capable of fully understanding. He is evil, but apparently not too much so. When you click on this badge:
it takes you to this funky site which claims to be able to calculate the evilness of a website or text passage. It's based on all this mathematical calculation stuff that purports to identify patterns in the Bible which show the spirit of God is present. It's hard to tell where the satire ends and actual true believer stuff begins. The links to Dr. Ivan Panin and the Revival Fellowship seem legit. Anyway, I took my most blasphemous post and checked it on the Gematriculator. It yielded the following analysis:

The text you sent is 29% evil, 71% good
pentagram pentagram

Oh, wait. I forgot about the Jack Black as Jesus video clip post. So these results may be inaccurate. I may be as evil as Randal. But I'm too lazy to check.

Randal has a commenter named Tengrain whose blog, Mock, Paper Scissors, has some great material. There were two posts which particularly caught my eye: one about activism to protect free speech at a local library, and one entitled

8th Grader Strip Searched At School

Yeah, you read that right. Because administrators were tipped off that she had some of this.

I'll give you a minute to go check it out.

Crazy, huh? Or do you think it was okay for the school to do this? If so, I think you're wrong. Explain yourself and maybe I'll change my mind. But I doubt it.

Moving on... let's go back to Lisa's.


Susan has just commented. It takes great self confidence to have a blogger identity that is this simple.

And she uses a cute little crow for her avatar. I am intrigued. She has three blogs. I pick one at random. Adventures, Ink and phantsythat will have to wait. For some reason, I'm attracted to Baby Days.

This is cool! Seriously cool. There are eighteen panels of pen and ink drawings of babies, coupled with a rhyming story which concludes (don't worry, it's not like it's a spoiler or anything)

Baby days, sweet baby days We've all been there you know Hearts are filled with sweet delight To watch our babies grow We hold them for a moment As their childhood slips away We're only catching glimpses of wondrous baby days
It's so pretty, it's like a song. Susan's work reminds me of Edward Gorey's pen and ink drawings. Only hers are less creepy. The girl's got talent! But I discovered something about Gorey I didn't know before while looking for one of his drawings to illustrate this post. He was a William Shatner fan! Blogger Shaenon K. Garrity posts an article about this amazing fact; she drew a whole Goreyesque cartoon sequence about the Star Trek Trouble with Tribbles episode here.

Back to Susan. I note that she is from Portland, Oregon. Or maybe Tuvalu. Her profile is a little confusing. But still, small world, eh?

And I had a John Muir moment (When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the Universe.): Remember Jean Reno, from yesterday, who was born in Casablanca? Wikipedia tells us that "One of [Gorey's] stepmothers was Corinna Mura (1909-65), a cabaret singer who had a small role in the classic film Casablanca as the woman playing the guitar while singing "La Marseillaise" at Rick's Café Américain.

That's enough entertainment for today. Go do your laundry.

8 comments:

La Belette Rouge said...

I HEART Lisa's blog, her writing and her amazing candor. I am also a big fan of her followers. Your right. She does attract really funny, smart, and interesting people to her sight. I love Susan. She is incredibly wise, creative and her work is beautiful. I even love Randal( but don't tell him I said that. I wouldn't want his head to get too big and for him to not fit in his baseball cap.;-).

lisahgolden said...

This is so lovely, FF. I am crazy about my followers and it's a kick to see them through your eyes. I've gotten to know some of them better than others and will share a couple of secrets with you here. I have the most entertaining email exchanges with Randal whenever he posts a comment at my blog.

And I'm a proud owner of one of susan's silk purses with an incredibly fabulous hand-painted design. I carry my now-dead iPod in it. susan may cringe to hear me say this, but I also kind of treat the bag like a lovey, a security blanket. It goes nearly everywhere with me. And I love her pen and ink drawings (she even drew one for me last year when I was leaving GA for NYC in an aborted attempt to run away from home.)

P.S. I'm a Gorey fan, too. In fact, I picked up a book of Gorey interviews and pictures that I read all the time when I'm, well, otherwise indisposed. (talk about oversharing!)

Thank you for the linky love. And smooches to La Belette, as well. I feel as if we could be sisters.

shrink on the couch said...

I listened to an interview with the student who was strip searched. I am opposed to this. For starters, what is to stop bullies from falsifying allegations? Checking backpacks and lockers? Yes, maybe, in limited circumstances. But allowing school officials to make a child disrobe? There is so much risk of abuse here.

I very much want to hear the arguements of this case, but in general I think kids deserve the same rights and protections as adults.

Becky said...

Cool! Thanks for the recs! I am always looking for more quality blogs to read.

And I totally remember that woman in Casablanca. She's a scene stealer.

susan said...

Ahh, this is a very nicely done tribute to some of my closest blogging friends. Lisa and Randal I've known since the earliest days (which only seem long ago). They're both as cool as you've noted. I hope you've been by to read a little of dear Belette's beautifully written blog. She's very good and tres fashionable if it can be said that one can be wise, fashionable and incredibly honest in a charming way.

I'm glad you liked 'baby days' since it was a story from my heart. I think of it more as a grandmother's book than a children's story. There's not much in it to interest a curious child.

Thanks for your visits. I will post a link to your blog so I can come by now and again.

Tengrain said...

1/2 Irish -

Thanks for the link and the kind words. Yes, MPS and the Scissorheads are incorrigible spitballers, but we sometimes put down the Cheetohs, leave Mom's basement and act upon our convictions.Don't tell Lisa and Randall, be we like them too. Susan is new to me, so I need to do some homework.

Regards,

Tengrain

Randal Graves said...

I feel like that actress who was really liked when she won that gold statue but I am honestly drawing a blank as to who. Sally Field? I don't think she wore a monocle, but I also know she didn't keep as good a company as I do with the fine folks you mention here. Take that, Hollywood.

Fantastic Forrest said...

Randal - yes, Sally Field. And I like you, I really like you, monocle and all.

Tengrain - glad to hear you're getting out from your Mom's basement. Heh! MPS kicks butt.

Susan - yes, I have long admired La Belette Rouge. Baby Days also appeals to Moms and Dads and older children. The artwork is splendid.

Becky - it's fun sharing what I've discovered when I go traveling the interweb. And, yes, she was a scene stealer. Funny to think of her as Gorey's step mama.

PhD in Y - EXACTLY.

Lisa - So glad you enjoyed it. I enjoy your blog so much!

La Belette Rouge - :-) I heart your blog as well as Lisa's and the others.