Lunatics and Princesses

I just finished half-watching, half-sleeping through the men's competition at Nationals.

Thoughts:

I'm still not really used to the new scoring system. I miss the six scale, if only because I'm stupid at math and they tend to throw big numbers that require addition at you, and everyone knows that I suck at math in my head. This means that I can't tell where someone stands in the scores until they tell me right before the commercial break. The six scale was easy. 4= you totally sucked, 6= you rocked the fucking house. Easy.

It's also weird to see the skaters who started skating before the new system skate against people who started to compete at the higher levels after the new system was in place. They actually have very different styles; it's especially apparent in the guys. The old school is people like Tim Goebel and Michael Weiss, whose skating is more... I dunno... wooden, kind of. I.e., these new kids are doing shit like laybacks. When the fuck has a guy ever done a layback in competition? Ever? The only time I've ever seen a man do a layback was when Glenn was demonstrating one for me in a lesson.

Not to say that I don't like the new style of skating. I do. It's just that now I can't really tell right off the bat if it's a guy or a girl skating. Especially that Rohene dude... and man, he's got some kind of ass on him. Whoa. Very fun to watch, though. I felt bad because he fucked up all of his jumps. Hopefully, he'll have other chances.

Johnny Weir is very, very strange. Also a little creepy.

...

I really hope that they let Michelle Kwan onto the Olympic team. Tara Lipinski totally stole the gold from her at Nagano; the only reason she didn't win the last Olympics was because the pairs competition was before the ladies' and that whole thing with the score rigging went down. It was good that it did, because the old scoring system was fucking RETARDED, but under that system Kwan should have won. However, because of the scandal, they had to cover their asses and actually give the medal to the girl who skated the best that night. Which is like, the first time that's ever happened. Honest judging- on a performance- who knew? Still, Kwan got shafted.

Bah. I'm so out of the loop on skating. Sometimes I don't think it's a bad thing. I still miss it, though.

.

But first: "Karma has been ass raping us. Karma is in prison and has been saving up the butter packets for lube because it's gonna ride us all bareback."

I don't know if that's verbatim. But it's damn close.

Met Bill/Bearclaw tonight. We discussed various cosmic coincidences- like, I had two figure skating dreams in a row, wore a figure skating shirt today, and when I went into Lock 24 to buy a Shirley Temple, there was a stand-up comic telling figure skating jokes.

(Note to God: Okay. I get the point.)

Also discussed how OMG I WAS JUST TALKING ABOUT THE END OF THE WORLD/THE RAPTURE/THE END OF THEY MAYAN CALENDAR IN 2012 WITH NICK LIKE TEN MINUTES AGO HOLY SHIT WEIRD!!!!

And zombies. We talked about zombies. I fed some ducks and plotted on how to kidnap the ducklings.

Quack.

*stops imitating Scuttle*

Right.

Anyway, I had this dream last night where most of the people from the Lookout and some of the people from my public speaking class were at a figure skating camp. Let me tell you, it is pretty cool seeing Lopez do a double axel. Extremely odd, but cool.

The characters from CSI were the coaches. I got Hodges. It was really weird. Also, everything was beige. The walls, the ceiling, everything. And Hodges was acting just like Glen. It was a Glen-possesed Hodges. Except he left halfway through my sesssion because he left something in the mass spectrometer.

...

Found an apartment in the paper today. Quinn and I are going to check it out on Thursday. It's off Euclid/Westcott, three bedrooms, $650/month plus utilites. I uped it to $800 and divided that by six (the number of people we're going to try to squeeze in; two to a bedroom) and the rent was something like $130/person. The point is, it's ridiculously low.

Now I just have to break it to Dad that I'm moving out.

Yikes.

*headdesk*
*headdesk*
*headdesk*

We're supposed to write an essay taking a sociological look of a group we've participated in. Band, church group, blah blah woof woof, whatever.

And I'm like, what groups have I EVER participated in? I guess I could talk about our now-hiatused CSI RPG, or MESPT or something, but hello? One is kind of stalled and the other I didn't have much to do with. Plus I don't think she's talking about online things.

Girls Scouts was a joke. A hella fun, great trip of a joke, but a joke nonetheless. We were like Troop Beverly Hills except we didn't feel like proving ourselves.

Shit. I don't know. I'm going with figure skating, because at least it's a little bit fucked up, and they've got artifacts to talk about. Maybe if I psychobabel her, she won't notice that I was definitely on the deviant fringes of that social group.

Yay for loner sports.

In other news, Madama Butterfly FUCKING ROCKED and I slept the rest of the weekend.

Also my hair looks kind of cool today.

I'm having something close to a panic attack because I lent my chemistry notes to Christine to copy what she missed from Friday; this means I won't get them until Wednesday, which means I can't study them tonight or tomrrow. That's okay, really... I've got the book, but my notebook is fast becoming an academic security blanket.

At least I've got my lab book. Our first quiz is on Thursday, and the teacher told me he expects me to get one of the highest grades in the class- so I'm freaking out about nine ways from Sunday. I think I'll do okay, but I'd like to live up to other peoples' expectations of me for once in my life, since I never have before.

Today I told my English class that I was afraid of skating forwards. It's stupid, but it's true, and I've never told anyone that. It feels good, kind of, to get that off my chest when I've been carrying it around for years.

I'm totally, absolutely scared of skating forwards, because I'm terrified that I'm going to trip over my toepicks and fall and hit my chin.

Blither blather. Depressed and out of sorts today; I need to stop poking around the spoiler board at YTDAW. I need some anti-fandom, nothing-to-do-with-fandom fun. Which won't happen, because I have to go home and study.

Note to self: Euyler circuits and paths. Don't forget.

Welcome to the World's Shortest Skating Book Library!
Sure, we've all seen Zero Tolerance, My Sergei, Boitano's Edge, and autobiographies of girls who haven't lived enough to have autobiographies... But there is a long-neglected genre of skating literature, newly discovered by skating net.fans around the globe. Here you'll find books by all your favorite skating authors! (The Books they didn't want you to know about!) I've also added a section for the net.posters and chatters, so if you've written a book, or know someone who did (I will not post anything insulting, though!), you can submit that now too! Enjoy, laugh a bit, and feel free to add more, or discuss the ones here! =) Books added on 20 December or after are in the box below. That color-coding was tiresome! My little comments or additions are in italics.

* "How To Be Decisive" by Paul Wylie
* "Rollerblading: The Key to Extending Your Figure Skating Career" by Paul Duchesnay

# "How To Stay Injury-Free for 3 Consecutive Months" by Aleksandr Abt
# "Coping with Shortness" by Lisa Marie Allen
# "Tasteful Costumes" by Marina Annissina
# "A Crash Course in Driving" by Oksana Baiul
# "A Detailed Account of My Success as a Professional Skater" by Oksana Baiul
# "Knowing when to say when" by Oksana Baiul
# "My Life as a Jumping Bean" by Oksana Baiul
# "No coach, no problem" by Oksana Baiul
# "Waiting Your Turn" by Oksana Baiul
# "Why we're so close" by Oksana Baiul and Galina Smievskaya
# "1001 Tax Tips" by Gary Beacom
# "Pay Fewer Taxes Legally" by Gary Beacom
# "It's Okay for Guys to Hold Hands" by Sandra Bezic
# "OTHER Choreographic Genii" by Sandra Bezic
# "Costuming" by Denise Bielmann
# "Exercise Is a Waste of Time" by Denise Biellmann
# "Variety in Ice Choreography" by Denise Bielemann
# "Non-Canadian Biased Commentary" by Rod Black and Rob Faulds
# "How to Retain a Coach" by Nicole Bobeck
# "Skating without Sex Appeal" by Nicole Bobeck. Introduction by Oksana Baiul
# "Cool Celebrations: a guide to planning birthday parties on the ice" by Brian Boitano
# "New Programs" by Brian Boitano
# "Spreadeagles: Who Needs 'Em?" by Brian Boitano
# "Statistics" by Brian Boitano
# "Where to buy pants, if your thighs look like mine" by Brian Boitano
# "Blue Eyeshadow Should Be Illegal" by Surya Bonaly
# "Fancy Footwork and Graceful Gliding" by Surya Bonaly
# "Guide to School Figures" by Surya Bonaly
# "Mother Knows Best" by Surya Bonaly with Tiffany Chin
# "The Musical art- Figure skating" by Surya Bonaly
# "On My Own" by Surya Bonaly
# "Winning world silver with grace" by Surya Bonaly
# "Letting Go" by Suzanne Bonaly
# "Laying Low: How NOT to Attract Media Attention" by Shae-Lynn Bourne
# "Why I Stay Away From European Men" by Shae-Lynn Bourne
# "Gracious Losers" by Bourne and Kraatz (ouch! Well, I have to be fair... -HBG)
# "Rigid, Upright Postures for Ice Dancers" by Bourne & Kraatz
# "Christopher Bowman's Guide to Weight Loss and Holistic Living"
# "Fashion and the Smaller Man" by Christopher Bowman
# "How to Realize Your True Potential" by Christopher Bowman and Tonya Harding
# "Everything I Know About Skating" by Christine Brennan
# "My Technichal Knowledge of Skating" by Christine Brennan
# "Triple Axel Tips and Tricks" by Sebastien Britten
# "Writing Without Rumor-Mongering: A Guide for the Ethical Journalist" by Christine Brennan
# "Ballet = ZZZZZZZ" by Kurt Browning
# "Remembering your program" by Kurt Browning
# "Total Recall" by Kurt Browning
# "Understated Elegance in Athletic Costuming", Edited by Maria Butryskaya, translated, with a foreward by Surya Bonaly
# "Consice, Intelligent Commentating" by Dick Button
# "The Conscience-ness of Edges" by Dick Button
# "Contemporary Ladies Figure Skating: Comprehensive List of Modern Day Gladiatrixes With The Perfect Layback Postion" by Dick Button

( Read more... )

I GOT MY SKATES BACK TODAY!!!!!!! JOOOOYYYYYYY!!!

And Alta put a tiara in the box for me as a present, the darling girl! Pearls and diamonds on silver...my newest addition to the collection.

I was up till twelve thirty last night fiddling around with a sheet- a "woodland pines" print, so it didn't get the same effect, but *shrug*- and I finally figured out a way to drape it to get the backless effect. Now all I need is a way to figure out the collar to hold up the front. This is gonna be FUN.

Totally, utterly, beyond-all-hope insane, but FUN. I got the film, who's gonna bring the camera???

Hey, check out my icon. Simplistic, but for a computer illiterate fool such as myself, quite an accomplishment. *beams*

Mickey Fickey. Stupid hos, all of them. I'd like to take a garden rake to their fucking heads. Stupid judges. Playing favorites. Well, I'd like to play favorites with them. Favorite weapons. Target practice or spear throwing target? Go kiss an orc, you stupid fucking judges.

“We’re live, and this is Austrailia.”

What the fuck is that supposed to mean? Are the commentators now allowed to make stupid inside joke comments? Some guy said that he'd waited a year and a half to say that. And Katie Couric is a bitch with her panties in a wad and her nose in the air. (Hostility? Moi?)

Just finished watching the artistic part of the opening ceremony. I was laughing so hard I was crying. KKK on ice, LMAO. They were supposed to be giant icicles, but we all know that was the KKK on ice, chasing the “child of light.” Drama.

What fun fun fun things does this Olympics have in store for us, I wonder? Let me ask Miss Cleo… :: whisper whisper whisper :: Oh, lots of commercials? Really? Ten minute diatribes on the athlete’s sob stories that cut out most of the actually competition? You don’t say?

You know, I’d boycott this whole deal if it wasn’t for my intense interest in the ladies’ long and short. And I want to see, incidentally, how the ice dancers “tone things down.” What a riot.

I’m so sick of the blatant commercialism. Everything nowadays is one big commercial, so I don’t watch it anymore. The Olympics, the Grammys, the VMA’s… that was a farce this year if I ever saw one, and for some reason people seemed to catch on this time… nothing remains untouched by greed.

So you know what? Fuck commercials. And fuck corporate bigwigs who just want to make a buck off some poor sap who doesn’t know any better.

Or maybe I’m just being cynical?