After the party it's the afterparty, kirsacorrine.com/WordPress

I'm outta he-eeere (you know, like Doug from The State?), guys. I was trying to make my website more functional and instead I accidentally made a blog there. Because when it comes to web publishing I can't do anything right. But then I thought, okay, I'm just going to dump a bunch of sugar and water on this and make lemonade. Maybe if I gather my internets together then they'll coalesce into a support group and make each other better. Maybe my brain will magically (because there appears to be no other way) figure out some tiny bit of what it doesn't get about monkeying with domains.

ACCORDINGLY, you can find my witless lack of wisdom at Kirsa Corrine. Maybe I can figure out how to not make it have to be capital-W-word, capital-P-press because it annoys me that it's case sensitive. Ugh to the nuts and bolts!

Winter suns, winter skies

The only downside of giving notice and fleeing yet another job is that I no longer get to see the beautiful mornings. Sure, I could and do see the morning from home, and that is another pleasure, but I don't see it rising over the familiar landscapes of our region. Home is currently situated between hills, so once day breaks, it's a slow process before any direct sunshine plays a part. There's something different about waiting for the sun to make its way past the ridge for several hours from seeing it hang low over a scenic rolling vista. Sue me.

What's the next step? Substitute teaching. The pay's better, the self esteem is better, and I'd rather get bitched out by kids than middle aged nut-jobs who angrily demand to know "Why's everything bad happen to me?!" when they didn't notice that an item they ordered has an estimated shipping time of 1-2 weeks. I've finally completed all the preliminary work and am now waiting for the next board meeting to be approved for a certificate from the state. You know, anyone who may have had the joy of talking to me at the end of my case management days, there's nothing like working with kids, and I'm optimistic about pruning out the home involvement with teaching.

In the meantime... I haven't been as efficient with my use of meantime as I've meant to be, as usual. I have written a few pages in an ongoing and revitalized project which makes me a bit cheerful. I started painting, which is off to a rocky but well-liked start. Jenny Gump the rat terrier still remembers how to roll over on command, so I have some lasting influence in this world. Efforts to be a more fit and healthy person continue, but slowly, of course. It's so easy to be unhealthy and so hard to become healthy. Some people would say what's externally perceived as healthy, but I'll complain that bridge when I come to it and I've got a ways to go. Just Dance is, surprisingly, a formidable ally that Alicia and I do vicious Wii battle on.

We got addicted to and ran through all the Netflix episodes of Glee, and I'm highly impatient for more. I had an unhealthy skepticism of that show that proved unfounded, as it's one of the more balanced depictions of high school drama I've seen. The singing is a bonus.

Look, I'll be real, I hadn't intended to take such a long break from the blog this time, I just started hating life so intensely. Initially, this was supposed to a place for me to wax rhapsodic about those previously mentioned morning views.

You know, the ones where the ground's covered in a thick frost that casts a pale shadow on all objects but lights up golden in the breaking sun? Where the road sparkles with flecks of ice? Where the clouds cluster in muted shades to break the sunlight into rays? Weathered barns slowly disintegrating greyly in silhouette, their boards curling at the ends? Yeah, I miss those.

Ceci N'est Pas Un Defense of Twilight, per se...

But it is a defense of the right to enjoy Twilight. That's right: Hi, haters! I realized that the over-intellectualization of the Twilight mockery had gone way too far when I couldn't even muster faint enthusiasm for the newest movie. Not because everyone's right and this really is the abject nadir of everything wrong with women, Mormon women, popular culture, teenagers, and the world and I finally came to my senses, but because the amount of energy expended in asserting same everywhere I turned has gained sufficient gravitational pull to suck my small joy in vampire trash in and disassemble it.

Look, the first time I saw Twilight it was specifically to make fun of it while eating and drinking and smoking with my girls, after a "my life sucks and so does the weather" little crying jag, and it was totally hilarious and fun and it also has Robert Pattinson brooding around hotly. So for those reasons alone, I stake my claim that it's perfectly entitled to exist. Then the funny thing was that we had so much fun mocking it that I thought it might be fun to read the books, y'know, for a laugh. It would be less accurate to say that I hated the project I was stuck completing at work and more so to say that my soul was severely allergic to the project and no epi-pens for souls exist. I was dying of soul-hives. I therefore also reasoned, as soon as I picked up the first book and found that it would be no worse than some of the junk-food I've read, that I could dole out the books to get me through the assignment. Which I did and it was an awesome plan and it totally worked. The second movie came out not that long after and it was a great lady date for oohing at the hot brooding, laughing at the stilted acting, and reveling in a little supernatural action.

Obviously there's been a "Twilight backlash" for just about as long as there's been a Twilight lash, and that's perfectly normal. It IS ridiculous, it ISN'T well written, the acting IS hilarious. But the same is true for a whole buncha crap: Miley Cyrus/Hannah Montana, our president, the GOP debates, all of these fall to the same criticism. The Kardashians and Toddlers & Tiaras are, I would argue, about a billion times worse than all of the above wrapped up in an Internet nerd bacon macro and yet we all just shrug and roll our eyes at them. But a little while back, on my birthday and the release of Breaking Dawn Pt. 1, the A.V. Club posted a sort-of defense of Twilight's fans.

In essence, it acknowledged Twilight's shortcomings and the ridiculous nature of its scary devotees and its annoying omnipresence among certain demographics and then posited that since we all know and accept these facts, it's okay to let it go a little bit. It was short, it didn't flesh out that many of the criticisms that haters (could we call them FullLighters? Twisofts? No, Twisofts should be fans who aren't obsessed, people like me...wait, why am I even trying to come up with yet another name for a specific niche of people to define in absolute terms their relationship to an ephemeral low-brow cultural moment that will be as gone as the Love Boat in as many decades?! Why do we collectively waste our time like this?!) typically hurl in some misguided bid to Just Make It All Go Away, and it was perhaps a bit curt in its dismissal of the haters.

That being said, the response in the comments (and if you know the A.V. Club comment boards, then you KNOW what I mean) was stupendous. It was the world wide web version of a maenad frenzy, scraps of flesh (the flesh belonging to anyone who in any way had the temerity to suggest that Twilight isn't worth the bother or its critics are anything less than earnestly concerned for the well being of teenage womankind and Western Civilization) passed hand to hand over the angry mob and sown into the earth by the thousands of feet churning the blood soaked soil. Except that when I put it like that, the maenads, although terrifying and not-very-nice to their victims, sound kind of awesome and impressive, and this was not at all exhilarating or spectacular and was instead a creepy example of hive-mind and suppression of dissent.

I didn't wade in, I usually don't. I did throw a few likes at the one or two people who were able to express themselves in a coherent manner to raise some concerns about the motivations of all the vitriol. See, the thing is, I'm totally a judgmental and angry person, myself, so far be it from me to throw shade at people who want to get their judge on. I think I'm less so than I used to be, but that good old mainstream culture rage is the province of the young, so that makes sense. And maybe this is all no different, really, than complaining about pre-fab pop stars or televised national cheerleading competitions, but it gets all murky and disgusting as soon as it turns out that all that hate for Twilight is for your own good, Ladies!

Just say you think it's stupid and it grosses you out and you don't ever want to have sex with someone who likes it and move on. Don't paint it as some revolutionary justification for domestic violence that will have tremendous echoes through the ages after it corrupts the tender, weak girl minds that it enraptures. We don't need Twilight to give tacit approval to domestic violence, we already have Chris Brown invited onto Good Morning America to see if he can break a window because it enrages him to be asked about Rihanna's while he's promoting his new album.

Oh, it doesn't count because who watches Good Morning America? Okay, well, then I guess the fact that the album he was promoting, F.A.M.E. (Forgiving All My Enemies, because, as his mother says, he is the second coming of Christ, and therefore must forgive his enemies, even the ones who think it's not cool to beat the shit out of your girlfriend on the way to an awards show) hit number 15 on the US charts can just stand in for that little publicity stunt to say that we as a nation are determined not to let a man who has publicly demonstrated himself to be an abusive partner fail.

Or the surge of #winning, and the fact that Charlie Sheen milked his latest outrageous publicity to the last drop before "reforming" once again, with naked contempt for the audience and celebrity machine that make it all possible. I've heard, and have acknowledged the validity of the point, the minor outrage that while it's okay for Charlie to shoot his girlfriends and roll his cars over the cliff and smoke crack with his goddesses while there are toddlers in the house and explicitly mention his boss's Jewishness when he's mad at work, poor Mel Gibson gets the cold shoulder for some anti-Semitic ranting when he's caught driving drunk and taking the pulpit at his church to excoriate the flock for listening to gossip about his dissolving marriage and knocking up some gold digger from Eastern Europe and threatening to kill her if she doesn't blow him in the Jacuzzi and accidentally grazing his baby when he's trying to get his hands on the gold digger to knock some sense into her.

My opinion is that it's okay for Charlie and Chris and Alec Baldwin to (again, publicly) be abusive domestic partners because they pay lip service to the idea that we're an enlightened society, and they're really very progressive, they just act like cavemen because the fame game is such a whirlwind and it's okay if you're on drugs, while Mel Gibson does not at all toe the Hollywood line in cultural matters and defiantly stepped out of line to get all Jesus-y and therefore does not have open arms willing to rock him back to the box office because he sneered at those arms, he found those arms decadent and depraved, and now they're not there. But he thinks Satan's out to get him for being one of the 5% who aren't afraid to re-post this status on Facebook, so let's not shatter his illusion.

And yet you might, if you listen for it, find people saying that we need to take Chris Brown's soapbox away from him, probably because of those photos of Rihanna's face, possibly because of the race factor, though I really doubt that plays as big a role as his fans claim when they very angrily demand that his detractors really must shut the fuck up.

Let's take it as a given that the only people that Twilight could plausibly be claimed to influence in matters of "what's okay in a relationship" are the young. How is Twilight going to get the job done any more efficiently than our cultural celebration of men who have repeatedly demonstrated that they are abusive to women? "It's creepy that he breaks into her room," says the internet. "He disables her car, just like an abusive husband might," they screech, leaving aside the fact that in the context of the actual story, the car is not disabled to stop the girl from leaving her relationship, but to prevent her from visiting someone who has an uncontrollable tendency to explode into a violent wolf, just like the story has established his pack leader once did with the consequence of maiming his fiance's face. "Yeah, okay, and that guy is supposed to be a good guy!"

Hm, that's true. Of course, the event is used to demonstrate the full Monster-ishness of the other side of the supernatural coin in the Twilight universe, so basically if you're going to be upset about the fundamental unfairness of sexual politics in contemporary culture, or the fact that yes, vampires and werewolves endure because of the ease with which they can stand in for or illuminate human attributes and impulses, then you've got a mountain of material to work with, and much of it more better than Twilight. But I don't want that to sound like I'm waving a magic "they're werewolves" wand at the fact that one of the peripheral characters fucked his girlfriend's face up when he got really upset once upon a time after seriously answering the "he stalks, he meddles," charges, because the other thing that really gets my goat about the Twilight hate is the constant bait-and-switch.

Whenever the questionable subject matter of a beautiful monster slavering over his girlfriend is answered with the gold standard of fucked-up plots, Wuthering Heights, the criticism always, always changes to "Wuthering Heights is Literature." Yes, it is. Man, them Bronte's, am I right? They're awesome. I love 'em. That doesn't make it okay for their plot to be riddled with abuse of all varieties, if that's your actual view of the danger of Twilight. If that's the Danger of Twilight, then Wuthering Heights is a perfectly valid response. Whether it's better written or part of canon should make no difference.

"Twilight's literally the actual worst writing I ever literally read, literally." Yeah, I know. A lot of people know that. That is not a ground-breaking opinion. It is hyperbole. But if you looked at it because it's the cultural phenomenon of the moment, and you found it poorly written to say the least, then rest assured that it's a proud entry in a genre which does not hold its authors to the highest standard. I think its great that there are people who make a conscious effort to only read great writing, to seek out provocative ideas and challenge their intellects. I don't think that to do any less is somehow reprehensible. To refuse to challenge yourself or to avoid intellectual stimulation, that's reprehensible. Enjoying vampire fiction is no better or worse than enjoying science fiction, etc. I grew up reading Star Trek novels, you're not going to hurt my feelings by telling me that Twilight isn't great art.

"I know some people who kind of enjoy it, for a laugh, that are normal, but they're obviously not the majority of the audience and that worries me." This, and all the casual stereotyping and dismissal of the soccer moms and lonelyhearts and creepy teens, turns my stomach a bit. Guess what, after you round up enough labels to toss in the garbage for enjoying a vampire novel and movie series, you're looking pretty marginalized yourself, Person Who Must Not Be Any Of These Labels. And the superficial judgement and mockery of "creepy older women," "ugly women," "awkward girls," well, that kind of speaks for itself. Like, wow, I'm so broken-hearted that you don't like me because I saw a Twilight movie, you're such an obviously attractive person inside and out.

"Well, I've seen Twilight, (only because of RiffTrax) and therefore I can say..." This is the answer anytime anyone calls out a detractor who has plot points mixed up, or is getting irate because of a summary they saw on a movie showtimes page. It's not that I don't want them to argue that they don't like it. I want them to sing it from the mountaintop if they don't like it, much like I'm here to say that Valentine's Day was terrible. I just don't want to hear the (only because of RiffTrax) clause every single time. It makes me sad. It's that old truth that the bullies only bully because they're afraid of being bullied. Fucking admit it, you watched it. You wanted to see what the hell the fuss was about and it sucked. Or be real and say you watched it, you kind of liked when a vampire ripped another vampire's head off, but the rest of the time it sucks because it's teenagers moping. Listening to arch-conservative Mike Nelson ain't really buying you the cred points you think it is, anyway.

(I love MST3K, I like what I've heard of RiffTrax, I don't think Mike Nelson isn't funny because I disagree with his politics, I'm just pointing out that the implied or explicitly stated instinctive dislike and mistrust of Twilight because of its prudish Mormon author is being ameliorated by a modern [and therefore lackwitted, in a lot of ways] conservative commentary.)

"It's not even a good vampire story, anyway." Says who? I got vampire clout, baby. I knows me some vampires. You, anonymous internet poster? I don't buy for one second that the guy who posts all day every day about the Simpsons' recent seasons is really up to speed on what's what in VampireLand. These books are clunky, but they have a couple of good conceits that make it interesting, and there's not much new under the sun when you're dealing with monsters as old as vampires or werewolves. So it doesn't matter that they're not great art because, you see, a fresh idea for someone who likes those old monster myths will more than make up for a less than stellar execution. That might be a bit tacky to admit but it's true.

Okay, I've vented my spleen. I feel a little better. I might even be ready to meekly enjoy Breaking Dawn, which I have now waited a full two weeks to see. I mean, we're talking low-vampire-libido. See your doctor type stuff. But I don't want to have magic-wanded Sam and Emily's little dirty secret. So, you're right, the cautionary tale of dangerous relationships gets a happily ever after in Stephanie Meyer's universe. Not unlike the ghosts of Heathcliff and Cathy.

The Idiot's Guide to High-Wire Balancing?

http://www.adn.com/2011/11/30/2196495/lieutenant-governor-calls-for.html

Well, now we know that "climate warming means more people are using Arctic waters," thanks to Alaska's lieutenant governor.

Finally, that pesky Is Climate Change Real debate has been settled, and it only took a lieutenant governor! And here I thought it was just going to drag on and on as the pro-business-at-all-costs segment of the political ARG within which we helplessly live dug their heels in and refused to listen to reason or results...oh. Oh, I see.

"If this is going to mean to global ship transportation what polar air routes mean to global air transportation, I think Alaskans would like to have a part of it."

So now that there's a piece of the action that doesn't involve hurting the feelings or profit margins of any Job Creators (also known as overlords, or sometimes captains of industry), it's rill rill important we don't miss out on the cutting edge of climate change's impact. Okay. At least you didn't throw in a caveat about whether it actually exists or insist that equal time be given to representing the theory that a bearded guy made the planet and everything on it and got a notarized testament giving stewardship to mankind. What kind of opportunities are causing shiny cartoon dollar signs to spring up in place of his eyeballs?

"Just get some big-ass boats and tear the fucking shit up out of the sea ice," Treadwell mused thoughtfully, twirling the waxed villain mustache he somehow grew around both his everyday Hitler smudge and formal-wear Satanic goatee.

Sure, no problem, it's just some ice. Who needs some frozen water floating on top of the regular water?

Photo by Mape_s under CC Attribution license

Aaaand the plot thinnens. The Parnell administration's insistence on being a hysterical control freak has pitted its members against charismatic megafauna before and the little Lego man in charge himself has said that trying to protect the habitat of polar bears is taking the food right out of his oil-baron-babies' mouths, but wow, I didn't know he was ready to take it outside and settle it with them mano-a-pata.

Actually, now that I put it like that, I'm imagining Parnell and Treadwell taking a boat to challenge the greedy oil-revenue blocking bears and I'm liking what I see...

Eh, I don't know if Treadwell's evil. He might not actually sport Fuhrer facial hair. He might not even actively want to harm the Arctic life that inconveniences "responsible" resource exploitation. I'm just so out of patience with that point of view that I want to put on fur drag and join the gang of polar bears occupying vacant buildings in Russia's Chukotka Autonomous Region and trying to pick off drunks and hobos passing by. I see dodgy 2006 references to increased bear numbers and clashes with populated areas, but I guess the big show happened mid-September this year, resulting in a modestly successful viral video that's scary, but not gory:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OIr0qtJaVg8

or http://www.anadyr.org/videos/masha-i-medved for somewhat closer to the horse's mouth

An unrelated bit of trivia is the regional attempt at lifting the Russian ban on indigenous polar bear hunts back in March, announcing they would share a quota with Alaska. The official position continues to refuse to allow any hunts due to the impossibility of monitoring catch in remote and isolated areas like Chukotka, and due to Putin's decision to personally oversee bears in addition to other cool animals he likes. Which, okay, he's a scary dude, but you gotta admire his panache.

Such Stage Presence

[Idioter's Note: Much of what follows was discovered in a draft folder. Mercy.]

Today, Alicia looked at me for a reply to some very quotidian query, and I nodded sagely before pronouncing, "Verdigris, verdigris! Verdigris, verdigris! Verdigris, verdigris...Om..." I went on to sing a few more recognizable lyrics from Furry Green Atom Bowl, by Robyn Hitchcock, before she quite caught on, but once she did, she was delighted.

"Such a good show," she enthused, once she got the reference. "Such stage presence! We're so lucky."

I'm paraphrasing a bit, but these quotes are largely accurate. This is also, basically, perhaps disappointingly, what I wanted to get at a month ago. After she said this, I of course agreed wholeheartedly. We saw Robyn Hitchcock host a showcase at HoCo Fest last September in Tucson, and it was a fantastic experience all around.

First of all, to get there we left the gorgeous Jimenez mountain range in Los Alamos (and the charms of the Laughing Lizard can't be overstated) and drove hard to the southern border of the country before swinging west to Tucson, under the blessings of a heavy-if-not-perhaps-full-moon. Then we scrabbled up a hilarious cabbie and caught the Meat Puppets for the second time that fall, and it was as enjoyable as Bumbershoot, only this time we knew we would be delighted and accordingly crowded quite close to the stage, enjoying a near front-row view. After sunning by the pool with dips to maintain our core temperature at a livable level, and after finally finishing Spook Country by William Gibson, we got ready, had another hilarious cab ride to the Hotel Congress, and waited anxiously as near the stage as we could be (which was functionally still first or second row).

I want to tell you my heart nearly stopped when Robyn Hitchcock cut his way from the bar along the side of the room to the door backstage. And when he took the stage. And when he opened his mouth. And the rest of the night. It's a miracle I survived. He shared the night with some musicians, I'd say friends but I'm not sure whether he hand-selected the occasionally interesting trainwreck that is Victoria Williams. I know that sounds mean. Imagine how mean it is to insist that people who are watching a man whose work they have held in the highest possible regard, whom they have cherished and idolized and functionally worshiped since they were teenagers surrender that chance to see a performance that they had lusted after for, literally, decades (I'm rounding up because that is a privilege you are accorded when you are OLD), so as to make room for the fumbling non-performance of someone who is occasionally not able to finish a song they start because they're so wrapped up nitpicking their own performance.

Don't get me wrong, I think it sounds like a far worse hell to be that performer than to watch, and wait for the show to get back on track or someone else to start playing, and I appreciate that as uncomfortable as it might be to watch, it's more uncomfortable to be in that position, and bees sting us because they're more afraid than we are and all of that. I seriously do get that. But I'm sorry, did you hear me? Robyn Hitchcock is sidelined for this mess? Oh, I kid. It was an awesome night, stumbles and all, and it was just terrific to get good and exposed to Howe Gelb and Steve Wynn, so it was a success if only for that!

But that dichotomy, between someone who has the respect for the audience to, say, address them as peers, or speak to them in a frank and personable matter, and someone who addresses them (and I'm deeply sympathetic) as potentially hostile captives who might be taking camera videos (and I didn't, Victoria, though I did snap a pic, but that phone was stolen so chalk it up to karma) to show their parents and get you fired by the school board is stark when you're confronted with such a showcase. It speaks to the magic of interpersonal relations that an individual can address a large audience and for that audience to feel that they are directly, personally engaged with the performer.

It's something that you see referenced a lot, but when you experience it, you realize that it may just be bandied about a bit more often than it ought to be. While I might want to see more of Robyn live (oh, I do, btdubs, if anyone wants to spring for tickets/airfare) and I would still want to press forwards to be as close as possible to the performance, to feel as personally connected as possible, nothing will ever be able to take away the experience that I had in September of 2011. I connected with an artist whose works have touched my life long before I was able to see them in person. That feeling is rare, and I enjoy it both in such a celebrity venue as an Elvis Costello concert (believe me, I want to SQUEAL just thinking about how close he was, how it felt to look him in the eye directly as he sang) as well as when I catch the eye of another working Joe or Jane and recognize that spark of aliveness, of presence, leaping out of their gaze.

Consciousness is a wonderful thing, people. We need to cultivate it. I've met dogs who put some of you to shame, and that's no insult to the dogs. Recognize your fellow individuals and take joy in the meeting.

And that's when I realized the spam bots were the only people in the world

I was going to write some whole thing about the divorce between physical work and the constant application thereof necessary to survive the world and the phony work ethic it inspired in the modern, post-industrial world wherein "work" is considered to be a cerebral application, except that it fails to meaningfully engage the mind or spirit and is often transparently only used in the service of the bizarre thousand niches that have sprung up around the middle class and the institution of a regular work day and schedule such that everyone is routinized in the exact same way regardless of the exact nature of their employment and so on and so forth....but DULLSVILLE!

Also I'm just tired and cranky today. I only blog on tired and cranky days because I don't have the pep to do anything else or enjoy life, so I'm driven to the computer screen so that it can make me tireder and more cranky. I spend the interim thinking of posts that never make it.

I'm obviously not missing anything in the cyberspace, though, the only messages I get are spam bots asking me to come to their website or add them on an instant messenger, and the only followers I get on Twitter (okay, this is not technically true, I actually have a few very cool followers which in turn makes me feel very self-conscious and pee-shy about twitting) are weird empty spam bots that think I will follow them back and be told about working from home part time to earn $7,000 a month. The spams write me nice messages sometimes. And they make it look like this blog has pageviews. Thank you, spams, I didn't realize you were the right guy for me all along, this rom-com is OVAH!

Then be careful / And watch how you treat every living soul

See, I'll put those lyrics in the subject line, because I'm listening to Band of Horses right now, and enjoying them so much right now, and feeling those words, and then I'll log into this blog in a few days and the stats will say that, like, seven people looked at it and I'll get all excited and then the traffic will say it was all huddled refugees from Google and Bing trying to look those words up from when they were hearing them and feeling them and I'll know they just clicked this link and then blinked at it (thickly [let's be honest, they're not the best and brightest]) and then hit the back button. Fuck em! Wait, that's not how I want to treat every living soul...

Unless you define the soul as being a purely human conceit and possession. Then I could probably get behind some soul brutality. Heh, Rise of the Planet of the Apes came out and was positively reviewed and so far as I know at least a modest success at the box office and heralded as slipping quite a bitter little animal rights agenda into its thrills and chills, but here we are, it's gone, and the dawning era of the Brotherhood of Animalia has yet to cast its first rays onto the plain of The Battlefield Of The War Between Kingdoms, Phylogenically Speaking. Or even the plain of Understanding And Appreciation Of Life In This Weird, Generally Life Barren As We Know It Neck-Of-Space. Completely hopeless.

Not dissimilar to that aforementioned terrible idea of dabbling back into the irresistible pool of NaNoWriMo. There are a lot of really funny tweets and such mocking NaNoWriMo and I just want to say that as someone who isn't writing steampunk, fan fiction, or zombie stories, they are really funny. Always get a chuckle. I can't stop quoting a tweet which is now annoying inaccessible because every time I try to use the actual Twitter website it seems to exist only as a means of making me insane with frustration. But it were really funny. Hitler jokes. Need I say more. And yessss, sue me, I'm still sort of half-assedly working on that project for NaNoWriMo, no Hitlers involved (in this one). It progresses very slowly, but whatever, it's an idea that I'd been kicking around for a while, so anything is good for it.