Hey evil_admiral, wananga

[lance_sibley]

bobafet posted this, and I thought I'd pass it along:

Georgia considers ban on gay foster parenting

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It's a couple of days after the news broke about Malcolm's suicide, and I'm still having trouble understanding what he did. I now know more about the situation, and my emotions have shifted somewhat since rockgoddes filled me in. I'm still angry at him, but now for a different reason, and I don't know how to get past those feelings (or even if I should try, or just let the emotions play themselves out naturally). There must have been reasons, but I'm sure we'll never know what they were. Any explanations now can only come from biased sources.

I hope that next Saturday's gathering will serve to help get some of these feelings out of my system.

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On a happier note... I've been ordered not to post about what happened Friday night after the Toronto Trek concom pubnight. So I won't. Even though I'm pretty sure the person who issued the command doesn't read my LJ... and it's not as though anything happened that he might not want others to hear about. (He's embarrassed about being an amazing singer, maybe?) Whatever.

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I watched the Emmys tonight. I was mildly disappointed that Shatner only performed the opening narration of the Trek theme; I was half hoping that he would sing Gene Roddenberry's (atrocious) lyrics. And maybe it was just me, but the opera singer (mezzo soprano, IIRC) who performed the vocal seemed a little flat. (In the off-key sense of the word "flat", you dirty so-and-sos... :P) I was amused when they showed a close-up of Shatner when Donald Trump and Megan Mulally were announced as the winners of the "Emmy Idol" competition. He looked like he was saying, "How could they have not voted for me? I'm the SHAT!" :)

I was pleased to see that they acknowledged James Doohan during the "In Memoriam" portion of the programme, and also pleased that he got one of the loudest rounds of applause.

Comments

[evil-admiral.livejournal.com]

*crosses Georgia off list of future places to live*

Damn. And Midtown has such nice high rise apartments! Well, I have always been interested in living in Boston...

[boywhocantsayno.livejournal.com]

Boston's nice. I have friends there.

There's also Toronto... ;)

[evil-admiral.livejournal.com]

Mike really wants to stay in the South as much as possible. I wouldn't mind living in Toronto or Canada in general, but I think Baltimore and Boston may be as far north as I could drag Mike.

[boywhocantsayno.livejournal.com]

Is it because he has family in the south, or has he been misinformed and thinks that we're buried under six feet of snow year-round? :P

[evil-admiral.livejournal.com]

Yeah, its because the majority of his family is in Florida that he wants to stay down here. Now while I would like to stay near my family (they arte all either around Atlanta or in Alabama), I wouldn't exactly be opposed to getting far away from them.

The Martian Child

[sciffy-circo.livejournal.com]

Have you read "The Martian Child" by David Gerrold? He was one of my favourite writers long before that. When I found he'd won the Hugo award for the short story in F&SF (1995, I think) I knew I had to get a copy of the book.

I'm straight, but my dad is trying to adopt my daughter. I got him a copy of the book for his birthday, and he later said he put it down pretty early. He didn't like it, and he didn't want to talk about why. I can probably guess. It's about a gay parent (David Gerrold himself) in his quest to adopt a special needs kid (real life fictionalized story about his own adopted son).

Also, there's a movie in the works. It's already mentioned on Internet Movie Database. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0415965/

I'm guessing you've heard of, or possibly even met the author. He wrote "The Trouble With Tribbles" for Star Trek, and I think he was a GOH at one of the Gaylaxicons. If you haven't read it, I'd suggest you check around your local bookstores for a copy. It's been published by at least two different publishers, and I think I've got version #2.


Eww, I just looked at the IMDB info. I guess they're changing it drastically for Hollywood. Something about "following the death of his fianceé" leads me to think they've elimiated the gay father angle. Also, the fact that John Cusack is playing the father, and Joan Cusack has some other unnamed role. Yep, definately changing the original story there. Get the book.

Re: The Martian Child

[boywhocantsayno.livejournal.com]

It's one of the few of David's books that I haven't read yet, actually. (I'll likely get to it once my reading pile is drastically reduced.) And yes, I have met him, two or three times (at the last two Gaylaxicons, and I think he was also at last year's Worldcon, though I may be wrong). Nice guy. (The picture of me that Chaz Boston-Baden had on his site before the crash, in which I was wearing a pink t-shirt, was actually taken by David. :) )

It doesn't surprise me that Hollywood would change the story, though IIRC David did have a fiancée at one point when he was much younger, before he came out. It's a shame, because the story is much more interesting if left intact. (Again, I haven't read it, but I've heard the story of Sean's adoption via other sources.)

Re: The Martian Child

[sciffy-circo.livejournal.com]

Had an incident of small world syndrome. I originally met David Gerrold, WAY back when, on GEnie. Yeah, back in 1986 or so, I was online even then, and using my mom's account, paid for by my dad. I asked how to change my userid to Captain Sciffy, and found out just a few years ago that's it's entirely possible that Marah marahsk was the moderator of the SF Forum back then. Online, he was discussing Star Trek, his latest books (I think Voyage of the Star Wolf), and his failed ST:TNG script, Blood and Fire.

I later met him again at Westercon in Anaheim, in 1989. I found the dealers table for Dangerous Visions bookstore, and saw a copy of that script. As I picked it up, the shopkeeper shouted, "Hey David, wanna autograph your stuff for this young lady?" I had a nice talk with him again, and he remembered Captain Sciffy from a few months earlier too. :)

That con brings up several small world syndrome episodes, and past-con experiences. My friends from Phoenix attended. Harlan Ellison was also a guest. Last year at Dragoncon, I saw my friend Heather again, my best friend from Phoenix. She's coming to visit me in Chicago for Windycon, and she was holding my hand when my son was born. Also, at that Dragoncon, Harlan Ellison was again a GOH.

Another instance? At that Westercon, Harlan had an unannounced midnight story hour. When I lived in Springfield, Missouri, from 1994-1998, a friend and I shared past con experiences. "Oh, you were two away on his left? I was three away on his right!" So, really, I COULD list you as a job reference, and say I've "known" you since 1989, right? Yeah... 5 years? I can do that! ;)

In 1990, David Gerrold was GOH at Coppercon 10, and my Chicago friend, Neil, came to visit me in Phoenix. This was Neil's first, and only con. David had a panel called "Meet David Gerrold", which we both attended. Neil asked, "Mr Gerrold, what can we do to bring good quality sci-fi back to television?"

David replied, "Okay, first off, I'm not sure where to begin with that sentence. There's at least three things wrong with it. To start with, Hi, I'm David. Next, please don't use the term 'sci-fi'. That's a term the media came up with, and us 'science fiction afficionados' do not appreciate it. Third, you're assuming that we ever HAD good quality science fiction on TV!" This brought numerous laughs and groans. "But, to answer your question, the first thing we do is kill all the producers." (More laughter.) "No, seriously, we have to start there..."

He went into a lengthy discussion, and Neil was remembered. For an encore, Neil later asked Leslie Fish to sing "the Kipling song". As Leslie described it from memory in 2000, "I literally threw THE BOOK at him and said, 'Here. Find it. I have the original 7-foot long shelf of original filk. I can only carry so much." Neil replied, "Eek."

For a second encore, Neil got himself drunk on Pan Galactic Gargle Blasters, and proceeded to enter the Bulwer-Lytton writing contest. He was awarded the "Golden Spitball Award" for the following:

There was a ninja turtle named Fred
Who took Miss O'Neill to bed.
He tried to teach her ninja,
But it screamed and it pinched-a,
till Fred's ninja face turned red.

He followed that up with another encore, drunkenly dancing the Time Warp at midnight. Meanwhile, Heather and I went for a different encore. We'd heard that David Gerrold loved cookies. We took Neil out for pizza, and stopped (in costume, of course), at a shop to buy some cookies. We put them in the car, to wait for the following day. We forgot to bring them to the hotel room. It's Phoenix, remember. Doh! So, at the autograph signing, we donated to the AIDS foundation Los Angeles, and showed David a melted bag of Oreos, and chocolate chip cookies. "Um... we tried?" He grinned and laughed, and said something about his room, a spoon, and enjoying them later! ;)

Ahh, I miss Phoenix cons... and so many of the people there. Some close friends of mine have passed away, and others aren't doing too good. :( The energy level and sense of community there is something I haven't seen since, but Toronto fandom does come pretty damned close. Chicago seems to thrive on chaos!

[ozreison.livejournal.com]

There must have been reasons, but I'm sure we'll never know what they were. Any explanations now can only come from biased sources.

not knowing Malcom incredibly well, and not knowing any explanations except only vague ones about what happened, and coming from a position that is one of someone with a mental illness, all I can add is this:

Sometimes there is no reason. Sometimes the chemicals in your brain make you do things for no good cause or reason or justification. It just happens. You can not apply logic no matter how hard you try.

Which is why anything like this can be so difficult. People as a large group don't like having no explanation. But sometimes youjust have to accept that it happened, and that's all.

This was probably not helpful in the least. And it was probably hideously biased. Take it as you will.

*hugs*

[antikythera.livejournal.com]

I was going to say almost the same thing.

I have a number of friends who have attempted suicide or who have seriously contemplated it. They've all said (in the same chatroom conversation) that once they're over it and no longer wanting to stop living, they look back and go "What the hell was I thinking? That wasn't me at all."

They all agreed that it was an irrational state of mind, and that there is nothing natural about wanting to end your own life. A person in that frame of mind is by definition capable of doing things they'd normally think of as atrocious.

So... we remember him the way we want to remember him, which is probably the way he would have wanted to be remembered-- because that was the real him.

[kosst-amojan.livejournal.com]

I was also hoping that Shatner would sing the lyrics. That would have guaranteed a win!