Wednesday, June 30, 2010

More on Racebending: Avatar releases July 1.

Forwarded from my beloved hubby, check out this *great* post about racebending and "Avatar: The Last Airbender" at Floating World.

Take a few minutes to look around the rest of the site - it offers some delightful writing and interesting point of view.

Saturday, June 26, 2010

The Nicest Thing

Yesterday, at a birthday party, a friend and I noticed Rosie march off to engage with her buddies.  My friend watched her for a second, then laughed and said, "she walks just like you do."

I got all teary.  That may be one of the nicest things anyone has ever said to me.

Turns out, my mama heart longs to know my girl is "just like" me, even when we don't physically resemble each other.

Monday, June 7, 2010

Beyond Richie-Rich and Archie

Reading comic books falls into one of those slightly secret things I do, and I when people find me reading one they often seem quite surprised.

When Bill and I got married, I very much looked down on comics.  Over the years, he took up the challenge to find graphic novels could suck me in.  He won - I now own most of several series.

The first character and story line that won me over was Usagi Yojimbo.  Simple line drawings matched with a complex and admirable hero seeking honor and justice in the world hooked me.  Just reading Stan Sakai's work isn't enough for me, it turns out this delightful comic ignited an interest in feudal Japan.  I've read many great books from the young adult fiction section on the subject, but this rabbit samurai is by far my favorite.







Elfquest, introduced to my by one of the plethora of Jen's in my life, captured my interest, both for the storyline and the lovely art.  Additionally, Theo took up reading it and it was the first comic interest we shared. This is a long running series and there are something near a trillion of them.  So far I've stuck with the earlier books as the story takes some twists and turns I'm not sure I'm ready to follow. I really love the art.







Girl Genius combines compelling art with a smart, strong and sexy heroine.  Theo and I both love the storyline and the creations by the inventor heroine.  So far, I'm current on all the books and anxiously awaiting the publication of the next.  I was years into enjoying this book before it occurred to me I'd fallen prey to the enjoyment of a serious sub-genre called steampunk.  I fear I grow geekier by the minute.


How about you?  Any comic book lovers out there?  What do you read?

Sunday, June 6, 2010

Racebending

Do y'all know that my husband works as a cartoonist?  He's very funny.

Being married to a cartoonist means that our life and home swim with superheroes, comics and pop culture.  All of this being mostly foreign to me, I have learned over the years to enjoy and embrace quite a bit of it.

One of the scandals in the community right now comes from the release of The Last Airbender movie.  Turns out the cartoon features Asian and Inuit characters but Paramount chose to cast white actors for the roles.  After serious public outcry, they did manage to pick one non-white person as a main character.  In the role of the bad guy, of course.

People outraged by this whitening of their beloved heros mobilized online - and very cleverly named their site Racebending. Go check it out to learn more about the specifics of The Last Airbender, but also prejudice casting behaviors and how Hollywood's racist practices affect us all, especially our kids looking for heros that look like them.

I'm really impressed by the work by the Racebender crew. Seems like every in real life (IRL) discussion and virtual discussion group should all agree to follow the guidelines outlining racism discussion policies.

Friday, June 4, 2010

Song of the Week





An oldie but goodie from my 1970's childhood: Porcupine Pie by Neil Diamond.  Can't say the associated video does much for me.

Traveling to Philly several years ago, I happened to see Neil Diamond on some good morning show.  Somehow over the past 25 years the man got old.  Yikes!

Some of the lyrics surprised me as they differ from what I sang as a kid. I always thought you had to "eat it with love so you'll hands'll turn green."

Porcupine Pie, Porcupine Pie, Porcupine Pie
Vanilla Soup, a double scoop please.... No

Maybe I won't, maybe I will, maybe I'll have
the tutti fruit, with fruity blue cheese

Ah but Porcupine Pie, Porcupine Pie, Porcupine Pie
don't let it get on your jeans

And though it sounds a little strange but
you gotta eat it with gloves or your hands will turn green

Ah but porcupine pie, porcupine pie, porcupine pie
weaves its way through my dreams

I do believe I'm gonna try some and
leave enough room for dessert, the chicken ripple ice cream.



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(and yet again, here's the whine about formatting in blogger.  Pictures NEVER show up the way in the final post as they do in my preview window.  Sigh.)