Dr. Who, Meta, Miscellanea, and Memetics
Jul. 8th, 2006 08:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alixtiiOkay, it's actually today today. Saturday. So that's good and all.
Spent the day listening to Dr. Who audiobooks, and I'm now ready to have Tennant's mpreg babies.
His Rose impersonation seemed a little off, didn't quite capture her spunk, and his Doctor was curiously understated compared to the way he plays him on TV, but he nailed Jackie and Mickey. Is that because they have more distinctive accents? And some of the other voices were just amazing. And hearing him switch between the Scottish accent (for narration) and the English one (for the Doctor) was so much fun.
And the dialogue given to the Doctor by the book writers was so perfect. It was as if you could hear the Doctor saying it. Well, you could hear the Doctor saying it, which was the beauty of it all.
Listening to the Doctor Who/Treaure Island fusion and comparing it to fanfic was particularly interestingespecially since the debt to Robert Louis Stevenson wasn't disclaimed.
Speaking of the Tenth Doctor, let me say I'm overall satisfied with the way "Doomsday" panned out. I agree with all the opinions of the people on my flist. This includes the people who hated, those who loved it, and those in between--I agree with you all.
I really hated Yvonne (was that her name? the Director?) and found her brassy and annoying (which is what I think I was supposed to feel, so bravo to the director, writer, and actress) up until the "Duty to Queen and Country" bit, which I found incredibly moving and suddenly made me like her. Now, no, her duty to Queen and country doesn't give her a right to trample all over the civil liberties which should be (are they?) in the Brits' "unwritten constitution" (whatever that means) and anyone who would give up liberty for security, even security against an alien invasion, deserves neither, so she still loses a lot of points for hacking into the CCTV system (and isn't that a contradiction in terms? doesn't CC mean closed-circuit?), but I still found that moment moving. And she gets added to my list of monsters: Dawn, Giles, the Operative, Roslin, Duncan, etc. Except I don't think she really thought out that what she was doing was wrong, she was "just following orders" and all, so natch.
I recognize that it's the nature of Who that Companions come and go but I like shows with continuity and continuing story arcs so I hope we will continue to see some of the recurring cast. I'd especially like to see Harriet Jones again. In some ways, my concern is similar to my concerns about the directions Veronica Mars will be going next season. (I better get to see Madison Sinclair again. Preferably as much as we saw her in the first two seasons, butshort of making her a vampire I don't know how to make that work.)
Memes that have been going around my flist, the first of which being answered in excruciating detail (includes visited countries, visited states, and combat card):
(Click here to post your own answers for this meme.)
* * * * *
create your own visited countries map
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or check out these Google Hacks.
Spent the day listening to Dr. Who audiobooks, and I'm now ready to have Tennant's mpreg babies.
His Rose impersonation seemed a little off, didn't quite capture her spunk, and his Doctor was curiously understated compared to the way he plays him on TV, but he nailed Jackie and Mickey. Is that because they have more distinctive accents? And some of the other voices were just amazing. And hearing him switch between the Scottish accent (for narration) and the English one (for the Doctor) was so much fun.
And the dialogue given to the Doctor by the book writers was so perfect. It was as if you could hear the Doctor saying it. Well, you could hear the Doctor saying it, which was the beauty of it all.
Listening to the Doctor Who/Treaure Island fusion and comparing it to fanfic was particularly interesting
Speaking of the Tenth Doctor, let me say I'm overall satisfied with the way "Doomsday" panned out. I agree with all the opinions of the people on my flist. This includes the people who hated, those who loved it, and those in between--I agree with you all.
I really hated Yvonne (was that her name? the Director?) and found her brassy and annoying (which is what I think I was supposed to feel, so bravo to the director, writer, and actress) up until the "Duty to Queen and Country" bit, which I found incredibly moving and suddenly made me like her. Now, no, her duty to Queen and country doesn't give her a right to trample all over the civil liberties which should be (are they?) in the Brits' "unwritten constitution" (whatever that means) and anyone who would give up liberty for security, even security against an alien invasion, deserves neither, so she still loses a lot of points for hacking into the CCTV system (and isn't that a contradiction in terms? doesn't CC mean closed-circuit?), but I still found that moment moving. And she gets added to my list of monsters: Dawn, Giles, the Operative, Roslin, Duncan, etc. Except I don't think she really thought out that what she was doing was wrong, she was "just following orders" and all, so natch.
I recognize that it's the nature of Who that Companions come and go but I like shows with continuity and continuing story arcs so I hope we will continue to see some of the recurring cast. I'd especially like to see Harriet Jones again. In some ways, my concern is similar to my concerns about the directions Veronica Mars will be going next season. (I better get to see Madison Sinclair again. Preferably as much as we saw her in the first two seasons, but
Memes that have been going around my flist, the first of which being answered in excruciating detail (includes visited countries, visited states, and combat card):
(Click here to post your own answers for this meme.)
| ✓ I miss somebody right now. ("I miss my girlfriend" is sort of a mental catchphrase for me. Then again, I have a lot of mental catchphrases, inluding "What day is it?" "What's for dinner?" "Where am I going?" and "Clothing is discouraged but not forbidden." They're just random lines that pop into my head when I'm not really thinking about anything.) | ✓ I don't watch much TV these days. (I watch more than I used to, though, between Who and Veronica Mars and random other things.) | ✓ I own lots of books. |
| ✓ I wear glasses or contact lenses. (Glasses are hot.) | × I love to play video games. | × I've tried marijuana. |
| × I've watched porn movies. (I still remember the time in high school when, after class, I found what I can only assume was a pornographic video. When Brother Jim, the Dean of Students, walked by I immediately flagged him down and informed him of what happened, and he destroyed the video in front of me.) | × I have been the psycho-ex in a past relationship. (I've had no past relationships. Unless you count various relationships that weren't.) | ✓ I believe honesty is usually the best policy. |
| × I curse sometimes. (My expletives include "WTF?" "Zut alors!" and "Expletive!" I've never said the F-word. This might surprise those of you whom have only read my fic--I do NOT talk/think the way my characters talk/think.) | ✓ I have changed a lot mentally over the last year. | × I carry my knife/razor everywhere with me. (I really feel like I should, though. And that I should have a cigarette lighter at all times even though I don't speak. After all, I was a Boy Scout once.) |
| × I have broken someone's bones. | × I have a secret that I am ashamed to reveal. | ✓ I hate the rain. |
| × I'm paranoid at times. | × I would get plastic surgery if it were 100% safe, free of cost, and scar-free. | ✓ I need/want money right now. (Who doesn't? But I'm right out of college with a crappy summer job. What else?) |
| × I love sushi. | × I talk really, really fast. | × I have fresh breath in the morning. |
| × I have long hair. (A month ago, I had hair that was quite long "for a boy," the result of letting it grow for two years. Now I'm back to a crew cut. It's weird. I can't play with my hair anymore.) | × I have lost money in Las Vegas. (I've never been west of my current time zone. I had never left the time zone at all until I went abroad, and then I went East.) | ✓ I have at least one sibling. |
| × I was born in a country outside of the U.S. | × I have worn fake hair/fingernails/eyelashes in the past. (I'm assuming Hallowe'en doesn't count.) | × I couldn't survive without Caller I.D. (I don't have Caller I.D. Or a cell phone, for that matter.) |
| × I like the way that I look. (In general, I'm rather apathetic about how I look. I have a girlfriend, so she's the only person in the world I need to impress at the moment. I do need to lose some weight for health- rather than image-related issues, though.) |
× I have lied to a good friend in the last 6 months. | × I am usually pessimistic. |
| × I have a lot of mood swings. | ✓ I think prostitution should be legalized. | × I slept with a roommate. |
| × I have a hidden talent. | × I'm always hyper no matter how much sugar I have. | × I have a lot of friends. |
| × I have pecked someone of the same sex. | × I enjoy talking on the phone. (To whom? My best friend or girlfriend, sure, but in general I have pretty serious phone anxiety.) | × I practically live in sweatpants or PJ pants. |
| × I love to shop and/or window shop. | ✓ I'm obsessed with my Xanga or Livejournal. | × I'm completely embarrassed to be seen with my mother. |
| × I have a mobile phone. | × I have passed out drunk in the past 6 months. | ✓ I've rejected someone before. (I think I was eleven. There have been possible relationships from which I've extricated myself since then, too, I guess. I've been pretty desperate, but I also have standards, because if someone can't appreciate me then what is the point?) |
| ✓ I currently like/love someone. (*Smile.*) | × I have no idea what I want to do for the rest of my life. (I want to be an academic. School for life!) | × I want to have children in the future. (I'm all for it if the opportunity arises and I can support them and all, but I won't be upset otherwise. I'm not going to bring people into this world if I can't give them the best.) |
| × I have changed a diaper before. | × I've called the cops on a friend before. | ✓ I'm not allergic to anything. (In addition to being allergic to novacaine, marcaine, and presumably cocaine, I began to develop seasonal allergies in high school. Woes.) |
| ✓ I have a lot to learn. (The more I learn, the more I realize this is true.) | ✓ I am shy around the opposite sex. | ✓ I'm online 24/7, even as an away message. (I forget to put up an away message a lot lately.) |
| ✓ I have at least 5 away messages saved. (This is interesting?) | × I have tried alcohol or drugs before. | × I have made a move on a friend's significant other or crush in the past. |
| × I own the "South Park" movie. (I've only seen bits and pieces of the series and have never seen the movie. I'm not always comfortable with the humor.) | ✓ I have avoided assignments at work/school to be on Xanga or Livejournal. (That pretty sums up my college experience.) | × I enjoy some country music. |
| × I would die for my best friends. (I need more context, but very possibly.) | × I'm obsessive, and often a perfectionist. | × I have used my sexuality to advance my career. (Ha! Like that would work....) |
| ✓ I think Halloween is awesome because you get free candy. (But I'm too old to trick or treat in my municipality. I enjoyed what my roommate called "trick-or-treating for old kids" though: going to the supermarket and buying lots of candy. Then we went around our apartment building and gave it out.) | × I have dated a close friend's ex. | × I am happy at this moment. |
| × I'm obsessed with guys. | ✓ Democrat. (Technically, I'm not registered as anything, but I vote an almost straight Democrat ticket. (Sometimes I vote for the crazy liberal when I'm confident the Democrat will win--the benefit of living in a blue state. The downside, of course, is that my vote doesn't really do all that much.)) | × Republican. |
| × I don't even know what I am. (Homo sapiens sapiens, last time I checked.) | × I am punk rockish. | × I go for older guys/girls, not younger. |
| × I study for tests most of the time. | × I tie my shoelaces differently from anyone I've ever met. | × I can work on a car. |
| × I love my job(s). | × I am comfortable with who I am right now. | × I have more than just my ears pierced. (I don't have any piercings. My father doesn't approve of piercings on boys OR girls.) |
| × I walk barefoot wherever I can. | × I have jumped off a bridge. | × I love sea turtles. |
| × I spend ridiculous amounts of money on makeup. | ✓ I plan on achieving a major goal/dream. (Who plans on not achieving major goals/dreams? Although I suppose contingency plans are always good.) | × I am proficient on a musical instrument. |
| × I hate office jobs. | ✓ I went to college out of state. | × I am adopted. |
| × I am a pyro. | × I have thrown up from crying too much. | ✓ I have been intentionally hurt by people that I loved. (This is part of being human, but I can't say that anyone's ever been especially malevolent.) |
| × I fall for the worst people. | × I adore bright colours. | × I usually like covers better than originals. (There are some really great covers. Usually it's a simple matter of genre, though; I'll prefer whichever version falls into a genre I prefer.) |
| × I hate chain theme restaurants like Applebees and TGIFridays. | ✓ I can pick up things with my toes. (Depends on the size and shape of the things. Can't everyone pick up some things? I don't claim to be particularly good at it.) | ✓ I can't whistle. |
| × I have ridden/owned a horse. | ✓ I still have every journal I've ever written in. (Because I only managed to keep a journal for two days.) | × I talk in my sleep. (?????????) |
| × I've often thought that I was born in the wrong century. (Sometimes I think it'd be cool to live in the future and not have to worry about X or Y.) | ✓ I try to forget things by drowning them out with loads of distractions. (Sometimes. I still can't make myself unspoiled for the Murder of Roger Ackroyd, though.) | × I wear a toe ring. (Ick? Irrational squick, even though my mom likes them. I'm a bad male feminist.) |
| × I have a tattoo. (See re: my family's policy on piercings. Double that.) | ✓ I can't stand at LEAST one person that I work with. | × I am a caffeine junkie. (I don't drink coffee or cola, and I prefer decaf tea.) |
| × I am completely tree-huggy spiritual, and I'm not ashamed at all. (What does this mean?) | × If I knew I would get away with it, I would commit at least one murder. | × I will collect anything, and the more nonsensical, the better. |
| × I enjoy a nice glass of wine with dinner. (Wine tastes like alcoholic grape juice. I don't find it as repulsive as I used to, though.) | ✓ I'm an artist. (Literature is art.) | × I am ambidextrous. |
| × I sleep with so many stuffed animals, I can hardly fit on my bed. | × If it weren't for having to see other people naked, I'd live in a nudist colony. (?????????) | × I have terrible teeth. (I didn't have a cavity until I was 22. Now I have 5.) |
| × I hate my toes. | ✓ I did this meme even though I wasn't tagged by the person who took it before me. | ✓ I have more friends on the internet than in real life. (What makes an internet friend a friend? But if you count old classmates that I primarily keep up with via AIM, then yeah I count. I asked out my girlfriend over AIM.) |
| ✓ I have lived in either three different states or countries. (New Jersey, New York, England. The last two were for school, but I figure spending several months in one place counts as living there.) | × I am extremely flexible. | ✓ I love hugs more than kisses. |
| × I want to own my own business. | × I smoke. | ✓ I spend way too much time on the computer than on anything else. (That sentence doesn't make grammatical sense. You get to say "too" or "than" but not both. It's true if you go with "than," debatable if you go with "too.") |
| ✓ Nobody has ever said I'm normal. | ✓ Sad movies, games, and the like can cause a trickle of tears every now and then. (I cry at HAPPY movies. But I have a perverted sense of what happy is. "Everyone dies" is happy if they die LOVED.) | × I am proficient in the use of many types of firearms and combat weapons. |
| × I like the way women look in stylized men's suits. (End the sentence after the word "look.") | ✓ I don't like it when people are unpleased or seem unpleased with me. (There are people who do like it?) | ✓ I have been described as a dreamer or likely to have my head up in the clouds. (I've also been described as ADD, but I don't believe in the pathologization of America. I find it problematic from many perspectives.) |
| × I have played strip poker with someone else before. | × I have had emotional problems for which I have sought professional help. | × I believe in ghosts and the paranormal. (I don't "believe in" any empirical phenomenon. I accept the most elegant models as provisionally useful. Positivists have some things right.) |
| × I can't stand being alone. | ✓ I have at least one obsession at any given time. | × I weigh myself, pee/poo, and then weigh myself again. |
| ✓ I consistently spend way too much money on obsessions-of-the-moment. (This is healthy within reason, no? I mean life is ultimately meaningless, but we imbue it with purpose.) | × I'm a judgmental asshole. | × I'm a HUGE drama-queen. |
| ✓ I have travelled on more than one continent. (Europe, yo.) | × I sometimes wish my father would just disappear. (I mean, maybe, but the way this is phrased seems a little overstrong. But I'm very glad when I get vacations from the parental units, though.) | × I need people to tell me I'm good at something in order to feel that I am. |
| × I am a Libertarian. (I'm sympathetic, but I don't really have a problem with government intervention on economic matters as long as our civil liberties remain intact. I think a society has an obligation to the poor, and that we could become more socialist in a few areas.) | ✓ I can speak more than one language. (I can't speak more than one language WELL. It took me two minutes (while standing in line) to figure out how to say "Could I have two tickets for the museums, please?" in French, and that was the most complicated thing I said my entire weekend in Paris.) | × I can fall asleep even if the whole room is as noisy as it can be. |
| × I would rather read than watch TV. | × I like reading fact more than fiction. (No. Facts bore me. Theory, maybe.) | × I have pulled an all-nighter on an assignment I was given a month to do. |
| ✓ I have no piercings. | ✓ I have spent the night in a train station or other public place. (Stanstead Airport, preparing to leave for Austria. Also a McDonald's in Stockholm, preparing to return to the United Kingdom.) | × I have been so upset over my physical gender that I cried. |
| × I once spent Christmas completely alone because there was a miscommunication on which parent was supposed to have me that night. | × There have been times when I have wondered "Why was I born?" and may/may not have cried over it. | × I like most animals better than most people. |
| × I own a collection of retro games consoles. | × The thought of physical exercise makes me shiver. (Shivering would be too much exertion. I don't like exercise, maybe even hate it, but I don't think I fear it.) | × I have hit someone with a dead fish. (Sounds like fun, though.) |
| ✓ I am compulsively honest. (I'm not sure what compulsively means in this context, though.) | × I was born with a congenital birth defect that has never been repaired. | × I have danced topless in front of dozens of complete strangers. |
| × I have gone from wishing I was a girl to revelling in being a boy to feeling like a girl again in the span of five minutes, and not cared a whit for my actual sex. (Maybe?) | × I am unashamedly bisexual, and have different motivations for my desires for different genders. | × I sometimes won't sleep a whole night or eat a whole day because I forget to. |
| × I find it impossible to get to sleep without some kind of music on. | × I dislike milk. (I vascillate on the issue, but recently I've liked it. It needs to be cold enough.) | × I obsessively wash my hands. |
| × I always carry something significant around with me. | × Sometimes I'd rather wear a wig in day-to-day life than use my own hair. | ✓ I've pushed myself to become more self-aware and thereby more aware of others. |
| × Even though I live on my own I still cry sometimes because I miss my mother. | × I hand wrote all the HTML tags in this document. (I just used caps lock as a rhetorical device. I do find myself sometimes using HTML on AIM or while word-processing (things other than fic) though.) | × I've liked something which a majority of people claimed was either bad or weird. (I'm sure I have, but I couldn't name it.) |
| × I have been clinically dead for a brief period of time. | × Instead of feeling sympathy/empathy with people and their problems, I simply become annoyed. | × I participate/have participated in auto drag races and won. |
| ✓ I do not 'get' most comedy acts. (I believe in political correctness.) | ✓ I don't think strippers are money-greedy or slutty for dancing. (There are people who believe that? Grrr.) | × I don't like to chew gum. |
| × I am obsessed with history/historical things and can't wait for someone to build a time machine so I can be the first to use it. (I hate facts. I can get pretty interested in intellectual history, though.) | × I can never remember for the life of me where I parked the car. (Being at school was nice because I only had to look for NJ tags.) | × I had the TEEN ANGST thing going for at least 2-3 years. |
| × I wish people would be more empathic and honest with each other. (I wish for peace on Earth and good will to people, but I don't really expect to get it.) | × I play Dungeons and Dragons weekly. | ✓ I love to sing. (I don't do it anymore though because I suck.) |
| × I want to live in my mother's basement when I grow up. | × I have a custom-built computer. | × I want to create a certain someone's babies, even though there's a 0% possiblity of ever achieving it. |
| × I would be in a relationship with one of my pets if they were human. | × I've gone skinny-dipping. | × I've performed in three plays. (In high school sure.) |
| × I enjoy burritos. | ✓ I'm Irish and loving it. (I'm part Irish, part French, part German, part Italian. The Irish and Italian parts are the ones that get the most love.) | ✓ I have a thing for redheads. (I used to a lot when I was young, really before I became really interested in girls.) |
| × I am a twin! | ✓ Most of the times, I'd rather do something intellectual instead of doing something generically 'fun'. | × Once I set out to finish something, I always stay at it until it is completed before I move on to something else. |
| × I wish there were a way to erase past mistakes. (I'm not sure what this is asking. I mean, emotionally, doesn't everyone? And intellectually, I recognize that a) I am who I am as a result of my mistakes, b) creating temporal paradoxes is bad.) | × I sleep more than 12 hours a day. | × I wish I could be prouder of what I've accomplished, but it's never enough. |
| × I need more time to myself. | × I wish I was more open-minded. | × I hope that I go really prematurely grey. |
| × I download songs from the internet. (Not so much anymore, but occasionally.) | × I've just reenacted chapter 58 of Death Note with my best friend. (Huh?) | × I say random things to freak people out. (Well, freak is too strong. But randomness=love.) |
| × I'm still a little mad about the ending of Death Note. (Huh?) | × I love playing Truth or Dare. (I've only really played it with sober evangelicals.) | × I love listening to slow music, but I hate singing to it. (My musical tastes really aren't systematized enough for me to be able to answer.) |
| × Music helps me remember that I am not alone. | × Playing my favorite sport makes me temporarily forget my problems. | ✓ I think this survey is particularly long. |
| × I prefer my LJ friends to my real-life ones. | ✓ I can only hate someone that I love. (But loving someone is the easiest thing in the world, so that makes it fairly easy to hate as well, doesn't it?) | × I've ordered an extra two shots of espresso to an Americano at Starbucks. |
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or check out these Google Hacks.
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![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-09 01:24 am (UTC)Your municipality prohibits trick-or-treating after a certain age? How is that enforced?
> ✓ I have been described as a dreamer or likely to have my head up in the clouds. (I've also been described as ADD, but I don't believe in the pathologization of America. I find it problematic from many perspectives.)
While I agree that people are often too eager to pathologize/medicate, I also believe that there truly are neurochemical imbalances etc. in some people which are improved through medication. (My mother's best friend's son has been diagnosed with ADHD, and appropriate medication has made a HUGE difference in his ability to function.)
> ✓ I consistently spend way too much money on obsessions-of-the-moment. (This is healthy within reason, no? I mean life is ultimately meaningless, but we imbue it with purpose.)
I interpret this as potentially meaning "spending so much money on an obsession that I can't afford things I NEED -- like food."
> ✓ I am compulsively honest. (I'm not sure what compulsively means in this context, though.)
I think this is meant to refer to voicing one's opinions even when it is inappropriate to do so.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-09 02:19 pm (UTC)I suppose I'm enough of a legal realist (an inevitable result of having a police officer as a father) to believe the law is only that which is enforced; but I'm also enough of an idealist to be uncomfortable with breaking any law that is written down. I inhabit an uncomfortable hermeneutic position on matters of law (and for that matter ethics) wanting rigidity and pragmatism at the same time.
I understand what you mean about too much even for buying food, but I feel like we all feel like we spend "too much" on our obsessions even if we aren't starving.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-09 02:57 pm (UTC)I certainly feel uncomfortable breaking rules/laws even when I know I'm almost entirely unlikely to get caught. I didn't intend my statement as a "Oh you should do it anyway;" I was just honestly curious as to how they enforced it (since I find creation of unenforced/able laws v. problematic).
Even when not at the point where one's continued existence is in danger, I think there's definitely the sense that one could be using one's money more wisely (paying off loans, saving up for a down payment on a house, etc. etc.).
(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-10 01:48 am (UTC)Yeah, I really think everybody says "I could save be saving this" when spending money on soi-disant "guilty" pleasures.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-10 01:18 pm (UTC)Except for people like me who mostly _don't_ spend money ;)
(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-09 03:31 am (UTC)A closed circuit just means that the contents aren't transmitted on an open circuit (like television); it can still be hacked.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-09 02:14 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-07-09 02:21 pm (UTC)