halftime show

Above me and to the left is a Norwegian poster for Deathly Hallows asking HVEM DØR? but obviously me and my currently tragic haircut are more interesting.

OK SO.

This is a blogpost in list form, the third-best form for a blogpost.

WHAT IS HAPPENING IN MY LIFE:

--Running a lot.

--Working at Dillards to save up money to move to San Francisco.

--Working on a book, because who isn’t.

--Oh man, it’s so much fun doing that, though.  But not as much fun as this next one.

--Working on a comic with a friend.

--Found a place in SF.

--Living in limbo, I guess.

--At least SXSW is next week.

--Reading a lot of blogs of people whose writing ability I am just experiencing a jealousy manifesting as physical pain over.

WHAT I DID YESTERDAY:

--Dismembered like one hundred mannequins.

--Almost beat a mannequin to death with her own arms because I could not get the stupid arm magnets to connect who even designed those mannequins I looked like the Dillards Juniors Department Serial Killer.

Bits strewn about like I was getting a made-for-tv movie based on me.

--More importantly: Saw Love Never Dies, the sequel to Phantom of the Opera by Andrew Lloyd Webber.

 Which featured the sexy Phantom/Christine thumb war.
(That's about how high stakes it was, honestly.)
(God I loved it.)

THOUGHTS/QUESTIONS THAT WERE BROUGHT UP WHILE WATCHING LOVE NEVER DIES, MORE OR LESS IN ORDER:

--Did my eleven-year old self write this.  No seriously.

--Are they singing a walk of shame song. 

--Are Phantom and Christine the worst parents ever?

--It sure is nice Phantom has integrated into society so well that he I guess stopped being a psychotic serial killer (albeit a very sexy one) and is I guess the only viable romantic option?

--The many failings of this play raise some interesting questions about the strengths and weakness of a proper Gothic romance and Kantean aesthetics concerning the sublime (REDACTED BECAUSE SPOILER THEY ARE NOT INTERESTING QUESTIONS TO ANYONE BUT ME.)

--Holy crap I love freaky dark carnivals.  I LOVE THEM THE MOST.

THE MOST.

--Seriously worst parents ever.

--DID THIS PLAY JUST TURN INTO LAW AND ORDER: PHANTOM OF THE OPERA INTENT.

--How much of my life would I dedicate into getting Law and Order: POTOI to happen?  All of it, probably.  Obviously.

If I were more dedicated I would have posted Goren with a photoshopped phantom mask, but instead there's this.

This picture is the whole play summed up.

THINGS PHANTOM HAD IN HIS PERSONAL LIFE THAT I WAS QUITE ENVIOUS OF OTHER THAN THE ABILITY TO LOOK GOOD IN A SUIT AND A COOL MASK:

--A creepy little goth son he did not even have to deal with till the kid was old enough to watch himself

--A freaky cabaret carnival that he was the owner and artistic director of.

--A dramatic room to swoop around in and write stuff, and cry, I guess.

--Just like every member of the gender he was attracted to violently attracted to him

--An awesome wardrobe.

DOES THIS SILLY POST HAVE A POINT:

Kind of.

WHAT IS IT THEN.

Utah was a bit of a warzone for me.  Recently, on the same day, I found out about two things:  The Randy Bott being a racist (and by logical extension of his imbecilic argument, misogynist) thing going public—although I guess if I’m understanding correctly, that sort of thing had been going on in his classes for years.  That fact--and the fact that he went public--are being swept under the rug, as far as I can tell.  (I'm not talking about the church here, they released a statement which was great.  I'm talking about the public response of the religion faculty.)


This doesn’t surprise me, because that day I got the results back on my complaint about my sexist expletive of a religion professor—the investigator had talked to a bunch of his other students, and they found his “unconventional personality” and “sarcasm” charming, so, they were closing the complaint.  (Because, as you know, if there are two things that I just cannot wrap my mind around, it's sarcasm and anything unconventional.)  This is, I would argue, the tip of the cliché iceberg for all sorts of institutionalized crap in a few different institutions those guys were representing.

Seriously I was incandescent for an hour, there.  (With rage, obv., which is my go-to emotion.  My little black dress of emotion.)  Like white-hot-destructive-anger-of-the-Erinyes upset, which happens every so often. This is due to some good reasons, but that doesn’t make it any more reasonable or easy.

But then I realized it doesn’t (more or less) matter for me any more.  I never have to deal with those people or institutions ever again.  And it’s not giving up—it’s making a life for myself where those things and people have no power.

Choose your battles, and all that.

UGH that’s getting cheesy.  So but IN SHORT:

The new plan is to move to San Francisco and just love it and somehow in the course of my life acquire and head up a freaky-cabaret-burlesque and have a real live lair to write in and a bunch of handsome genius gentlemen friends, and we can all swoon over each other.  In costume.

Spiky spindly costume.

Anyway, that’s how I will be measuring personal deep-inner-self-instantiating success from now on.  

Why did I come to this conclusion while watching the worst/best musical ever?  Because that's the kind of sophisticate I am.