Ups and downs, at least holidays are almost here

I've been blogging for a few years now, but it was only recently, in about the last year, that I've really gotten into it.

I use this space to write about the important and trivial things rattling around in my head. I've discussed issues like race, politics, gender, social justice, art, craft, TV, knitting, celebrity crushes.

This week has had more than the usual amount of ups and downs and the past few posts have been really serious. Can't get much more serious than death.

Friday was the memorial service for Errin which went from 11am to 2pm. Well, actually the service started about 11:45 but that was time spent sharing condolences with family, or reading the Facebook homages. After sharing my condolences with the family, I sat in the pew for 45 minutes, waiting. I watched other people in the "audience" share hugs, tears, memories with each other. I saw people I knew and could have approached them but didn't. I was shy. I was tired.

Husband wondered why I was hit so hard by the passing of someone he's never heard me talk about. Where to start? First, Errin was so young, only 35. Second, she was so bubbly, always so happy and upbeat even in times of stress. I mean, last time I saw her, she was just laid off, but still focused on the silver lining: she had her own consultancy business and had 2 job offers, even in this economy! Third, she did so much for the causes of women's rights and human rights (which is how I first met her) and did so much good in this world. Her being taken from us so soon is proof that the world isn't fair.

There were also the personal aspects that got to me. During the service people got up to share stories, memories. We laughed, and we cried. Whenever someone talked about how happy she and her husband were, it broke my heart. I love my husband so much and the thought of not having him, like Dana not having Errin anymore, just make me grieve for Dana. Or was it for my future self? At some point, Husband and I will be parted and I dread that day.

In other happy news (not), today is a board meeting where I'm going to ask the board to approve that we cut staff hours and hence pay, including my own. I know that I have the support of Husband so the impact on our household will not be as bad as in other staffers' households. But the fact is that the money just isn't there. Fundraising is just difficult across the board for all nonprofit organizations.

I am looking forward to this coming week, Thanksgiving week here in the US. Sister and her Fiance are coming, as is Brother Two. They arrive Tuesday and leave Saturday. I have the menu all planned out and will hit the grocery store on the way home from the office this evening. I wonder if that's wise...

This will be the first Thanksgiving without Brother One, because he is in Taiwan with our parents. The good news is that we will call for Father's birthday, which falls around this time of year. And Brother One has access to e-mail so staying in touch with our parents (and exercise their English comprehension skills) will be so much easier and cheaper than phone calls.

Weird head space

Feeling weird today. Possible causes:

1. My friend Errin is dead, from a car crash yesterday morning. Having a hard time wrapping my head around that.
2. Had a couple of scotches from an impromptu memorial last night. Note to self, Glenlivit a much better scotch than Chivas Regal, my mom's drink of choice.
3. Trying to squeeze more money out of the work budget than is there.

Most likely, all of the above.

In a bit, I'll be off to meet a friend for lunch, then go to the pottery studio if it's open. I missed class last night for number 2 above. I waffled on coming to work this morning, but figured as long as I was up, I might as well. But taking the afternoon off.

goodbye Errin

Just found out my friend Errin Vuley passed away, killed in a car crash. She was 35 years old.

Errin always had a smile and she worked so hard for the rights of women and girls in Georgia. She fought for our reproductive justice: the right for a woman to not have children if she didn't want them; the right to have children if she wanted them; and the right to raise her children.

Errin livee her values of equal rights for all and was such a loving person.

I am going to miss her so much. I'm so glad I got to see her recently at a SisterSong conference. After the panel discussion, we sat in the corner at lunch and shared and giggled like girlfriends. She had just started a new job, had recently gotten married, was embarking on a new phase of her life.

And now it's all gone. She's gone.

So many thoughts ricocheting around my brain.

Husband's job as a lawyer is 90% about car crashes and he routinely talks about driving in Atlanta, or more specifically, being in a car in Atlanta as driver or passenger, being one of the most dangerous things you can do.

I haven't known anyone hurt or killed in a car crash, even as I've been in a few myself.

Also, just on Saturday I went to the dedication ceremony for the Phillip Rush Center: Supporting Atlanta's LGBT Community. Phillip was a friend of mine who passed away earlier this year. He was only 55. I wrote about it here.

I'm not religious, but I know that I've been really blessed to have known 2 such wonderful people, activists who really made a difference in people's lives.

I have so much to live up to.

Wine and Knitting

Went to a wine tasting party last night, wore my Hermia sweater. Some one asked me if I had knit it and I said yes and it was so nice to have a conversation with another knitter.

We also talked about other things but mainly about knitting. We may have been the only people there who knew what Malabrigo, Noro Furisode, Ravelry, and Interweave Knits was.

The wine was pretty good too.

And I finished my Malabrigo Oceanos scarf. Just in time for the Atlanta 70+ deg weather.

No Dollhouse Season Three

Yesterday it was announced that there will be no season 3 of Joss Whedon's Dollhouse and it just bummed me out. I've been trying to figure out why.

Yes, it's an uneven show but as I look back on all the shows I watch and even the ones that are popular, every show has it's ups and downs. On the whole I like it and want to know more about what's going on and explore the issue of identity, free will, and personhood.

Not exactly a ringing endorsement, eh?

I think it's because I loved Firefly, it's still my favorite Whedon show, followed by Buffy. I just love the characters and the humor. I'm all about the smart and funny. Dollhouse has the smart, not so much the funny.

I'm in the midst of season three of Angel and and season 8 of Buffy so I'm just immersed in the Whedonverse. Thus I'm just bummed that Whedon's show won't be renewed.

I would like to see Dollhouse on Syfy or another a place on cable which is all about niche audiences. On the other hand, I would like the general discourse on network television move away from reality shows. I know, I know, network TV is a business, it's about getting advertisement in front of as wide an audience as possible. Dollhouse just wasn't making business sense to Fox and so they gave it 2 seasons and then will move on.

What I'm concerned about is what they will replace it with. Will it be more reruns/copies of Bones and House, 2 shows I don't watch? There is a ton of police procedurals and hospital shows on all the time. Do we really need more? Where are the new ideas?

Enter Glee which I finally watched last night. It is sweet and light and thoughtful too. Last night's episode focused on Artie the kid in the wheelchair and the fallout from the gay boy coming out of the closets. There were other subplots too that could have taken the show into "A Very Special Episode Of" territory but didn't.

Husband started off saying "it this show going to be crap, Crap, krap, or Krap?" this morning, he declared it not crap.

And from what I heard, last night's show wasn't really up to par with the other episodes. I thought it was pretty good, so I'm happy to find a show to enjoy, along with Leverage and White Collar, shows that I watch actually smiling.

Flashforward and Dollhouse I'll keep watching because they keep me thinking if not smiling.

ETA: I agree with this, from Time Magazine:

Don't get me wrong. I liked Dollhouse. I often loved it. And when I didn't love it, I loved what it was trying to do. It was the kind of very ambitious storytelling that TV should be encouraging. Through a difficult (maybe fatally flawed) premise, Joss Whedon told a complex story about the nature of consciousness and human (especially female) exploitation, and he did it in the framework of situations and characters far more morally ambiguous than any TV outside a few cable channels usually allows.

Read more: http://tunedin.blogs.time.com/2009/11/11/dollhouse-falls-asleep-for-the-last-time/#more-7065#ixzz0WmStNJGH

Ebb and flow of marathon TV watching

Spent the weekend watching Angel the Series from Season Two episode 16 "Epiphany" where Angel sleeps with Darla but doesn't lose his soul to Season Three episode 4 "Carpe Noctem" where Angel's body is taken over by an old man.

That's 11 episodes of about 45 minutes each. All this while carving on my pottery.

I also read the liner notes from the DVD box set. Basically Joss Whedon says that they spun off Angel, but didn't really have an over arching theme like Buffy did. So they made it about anything and everything.

In this marathon watching, I liked Cordelia more and more. The pain from the visions are getting worse, and leaving physical marks on her, yet she's not willing to give them up. They give her a purpose and she wants to help the people in those visions. She's afraid that if she gives up the visions then her friends at Angel Investigations won't want her around. That a long way from the shallow vain girl at Sunnydale High School.

The side trip to Pylea was cute if a little cheesy. Fred's the precursor to River, the smartie who's a little scrambled in the brain pan. Cordelia's made princess, which she enjoys, of course, being restored a bit to her Queen C status of her Sunnydale days. And the Groosalug turns out to be quite the hunk and they fall in love. Still, in the end she gives it up to go back to our dimension.

In various episodes, people's loyalties are tested: Gunn between his old gang and his new gang; Angel fires Cordelia, Wesley, and Gunn, goes dark but not all the way to Angelus, then comes back; Harmony comes to LA; Cordelia's tests have been discussed above; and even Lindsey makes a choice and leaves LA and Wolfram and Hart.

However, Lilah's still got a rival, Gavin Park, played by the gorgeous Daniel Dae Kim.

I'm liking this marathon watching and may try to do it with Lost, Battlestar Galactica, or Heroes. I've been reading reviews and recaps of those shows on Television without Pity or just other places. One of the benefits of marathon watching is that there's not a week in between each episode for me to wonder what's going on, how will it be resolved, or to nitpick because the next episode is immediately available and I get the answers soon enough. Plus the amount of info and details in the sheer volume of episodes pushes out the dumber details and what I'm left with is the overall arc of the story and character development.

I read the recap of this week's episode of Heroes on IO9 which was very snarky and read the comments too. The recap was pretty negative and some of the commenters said that it was excessively negative, as if the recapper was looking for things to complain about and not also discuss the good parts.

I think the general trend towards snarkiness makes it harder for shows because there are people out there who do write negative (and funny) reviews that can drown out the better reviews. In marathon viewings, the ups and downs of a show even out.

That's what I did with FlashForward. I went about 3 weeks without watching, then watched 3 episodes in a row on Hulu.

carving clay

Husband's away to Pennsylvania for the Penn State football game, so I'm on my own this weekend. Last night, I stayed up until 3am carving on this bowl. Behind it is the inspiration for the pattern. I will choose a glaze that is translucent, so that the glaze that settles in the grooves will be darker.

I also really like how the clay gets lighter as it dries:

I was thinking of cutting a hole in the bottom to make it a flower pot, but I may keep it intact. Then it can be a bowl for serving food or holding yarn, or be a cache pot to hide the functional plastic flower pots.