If Someone in a Movie Show Yelled "Fire in the Second Row", Would You Notice Him?

There is an Arthur episode that discusses fire safety by focusing on D.W.'s first fire drill. As a kindergartener, she is worried that she'll never see the things she is forced to leave behind or that the school will really be set on fire for practice. These are legitimate concerns for a young child that has never gone through a fire drill. However, by the time a person reaches university, these concerns are virtually null.

In grade school, fire drills were a bit frightening, but they were frequent so that you could learn to cope. In high school, they were cool because you got to miss class and pretend you weren't worried. They were also less often, perhaps twice a year to refresh your memory. In university, you ignore the fire alarm.

While sitting in class on Thursday, the fire alarm went off, but nobody moved. The professor continued to lecture, the students continued to take notes, while all the time an alarm blared in the corridor. The professor said we would just go on as normal until we were told to evacuate the building. Now, universities do not have fire drills. If the alarm goes off, that means there is a legitimate concern for either fire, a lab explosion, or even a bomb. But no one moved.

At first I thought to myself, gee, it's so comforting to live in an age when safety is so accessible, when firemen or policemen come to your rescue at the drop of a hat. Only a hundred years ago, your only hope of surviving a fire was the family dog that barked at the smell of smoke or the naughty butler/farmhand that managed to be awake when the blazed was started. But now, in the era of technology, we have little alarms that tell us when there is even a trace of smoke or carbon monoxide in the air. How wonderful that we will never have to worry again.

Now, sit back and think about this. Alarms will save us right? Wrong. We are training our minds to ignore natural survival instincts. We know that these gadgets are very sensitive, FOR OUR PROTECTION, so we ignore them because we don't believe the concerns are legitimate anymore. They are becoming our boys who cry wolf. We are getting so used to having other people or technology save us that we can't save ourselves. We are so cocky in our dependence on modern measures that we don't believe in danger anymore. What if the entire arts building had exploded while we waited to be told that we were in danger? I don't know about you, but I don't ignore alarms. I'm going to hold on to my "scaredy cat" ways, my survival instincts. I don't want to be a victim of my own safety measures. So If someone yelled fire in the movie show, I'd notice him, and I'd hightail the fuck out of the theater. If it's a false alarm and everyone laughs at me, that's okay, because I'll be proud that I acted quickly and ensured my safety. Besides, if the entire town laughed at you for being a worry wort, the humiliation wouldn't last long. Third degree burns or blindness and amputation earns you looks for the rest of your life. And death by fire, well, that is the end isn't? that is forever.

A Short Piece

I am short. That's right, in a world where men average out at 5'11 ( about 1.8m)and women are about 5'5 (some at 5'8), I am very short. I am 5ft (1.5m). But you know what? It never used to bother me. When you are young, short people are cute. I've been told "short people run faster", "short people always look young" (this one from my 47 year old mother) even "short women have tighter vaginas". I suppose this was all to make it seem like being short is okay. But being short isn't okay anymore.

Now, I don't judge myself by other peoples standards; I don't want to be model thin and tall. But I'm getting really fucking tired of being called a midget. Midgets are people who are under the size of 4'8 (1.4m). I am not a midget. I will say it again, I am NOT a midget. Don't call me that. Midgets are usually, if I understand it correctly, the product of a genetic defect/mutation. Midget is an offensive term for dwarfs/little people. For many narrow-minded people, a midget is often synonymous with a retard (another offensive and narrow-minded term which often means, in its pejorative form, not only someone who suffers from mental retardation but who is also ugly, stupid, and creepy). Now, I don't subscribe to these views, but I won't deny that it is insulting to be described with a word that many people see as negative. I do not have a growth problem, I do not have a genetic problem. there is nothing wrong with me physically except that I'm short. Stop fucking calling me a midget. Stop calling me a dwarf. Or a troll, or a child. I'm perfectly normal. Catherine the Great was 5' (many at this point will remark that Napoleon was also short. He wasn't, in fact, he measured 5'7". that's French feet by the way, which I believe are bigger than English feet. He was average for the time, perhaps even a little tall. But, I digress).

When did being tall become such a valued characteristic? What can you do that I can't? I don't even want to be tall. If I can't reach something, I'll use a step ladder. But I'll never bump my head or have to duck uncomfortably. Shirts will always fit me because I don't have monstrously long arms. Pants never will of course, because the clothing industry must follow the norm. What I don't get about pants though, is why the larger sizes for women's pants have longer legs. Everyone knows that the pudgier you are, the shorter you probably are (this is not the case for men). And really, wouldn't it be more logical for industries to cater to short people? No matter how tall you are, you can always bend down to reach something. But I can't reach that 7 foot high shelf in the stockroom.

I used to not mind being short. You get to be first in line in school, and you can trick or treat for a couple of extra years before people catch on (although admittedly I stopped trick or treating at 13). I am very proportional and I rather like my bod. In fact, I have no problem with my height. It's everyone else who has the problem.

Parents are the Biggest Fucking Morons on the Planet

As you may have noticed from the title, I think parents are the biggest fucking morons on the planet. both of them, though I'll admit my father seems much more reasonable to me. I feel kind of bad posting this stuff on the internet but damnit I have to tell someone.

My mother, though she won't admit it, is going through menopause. EVERYTHING is a fucking attack on my mother. Don't contradict her, don't give her a negative comment or opinion, heck, don't even talk about something she disagrees with. Your view is not her view, so if you disagree with her you must hate her fucking guts. That's her logic. She lets every little thing bother her. an example you ask? here you go: We redid the living room, and by redid, I mean painted and rearranged the furniture. I'm not sure what was going on in her mind, but she seemed to think that changing the paint would make the furniture she hated look better. So when that wasn't the outcome, she had a fucking tantrum. She wished we hadn't done anything, it had taken too long, she hated the furniture and everyone who was telling her they liked it and that it looked fine was obviously out to get her and just didn't understand. I can't even explain the depths of her insanity. I'd be here for weeks. She's just so irrational. I don't know how logic works in her mind, but it doesn't work that way in any other universe.

Then there is my dad. As I said, I often find him more reasonable, but every once in a while he throws me for a loop. If you live in the same house as my dad, do everything the way he wants you to do it. It doesn't matter if your way works equally well, it's the wrong way if it's not his way. Oh, and his rules don't have to apply to him. Don't leave your dishes on the coffee table, in fact, you should bring them into the kitchen immediately after you finish with them, because waiting until a commercial will I don't know cause them to grow mold or explode or something. But don't worry about his tray, it'll sit there until he's good and ready to take it away. Unless you get up before him in which case, you should take it up. I mean come on, you're already up aren't you?

My favourite part of this small personal hell however, is when they argue. I'm the kinda of person who hates confrontation. Arguing and yelling makes me really sick in my stomach, often with unfortunate results. So you can imagine what it's like to live in a house where the above two are arguing. One thinks everything you say is an attack, the other thinks everything he does is perfect. My mother watches doctor Phil all the time, she loves him. Dr. Phil often asks couples "do you want to be right or do you want to be happy?" My mother, having learned absolutely nothing from years of tv, wants to be right. And the best part? As you noticed above, I know exactly what is each of their problems and how to solve them. Mom, be reasonable and listen to what people have to say without going batshit fucking insane on them. Dad, swearing is not an argument. try to see it from someone else's side. But my parents believe that children (even in their 20s) cannot possibly have valuable input when it comes to "grown-up talk" so I can't ever tell them any of this. They're both stubborn and unreasonable and I honestly am starting to think they only married each other for their looks because they seem to have nothing in common.

And the very worst part? I can't talk to my mother. I'm a daughter who can't talk to her mother. You know how in the movies the mother and daughter have a blow out argument, but in the end all is well because they see each others opinions and understand each other? Those endings make me sad because that will never happen to me. I can't tell my mother how I feel because it will offend her. And I really hate that. So I don't tell her ANY thing I think lest my views hurt her. And I spend part of every day in the bathroom in pain because of their arguing.

I understand James Dean now in Rebel Without a Cause and I echo his famous line: You're tearing me apart.

Musings on a Galaxy Far, Far Away

I just finished watching the original Star Wars trilogy. No really, I'd never seen it before. Space has never interested me; I'm the kind of person who is scared shitless by alien movies because heck, most of the beings on Earth scare me and really, I'll never get to see most of what's on my own planet, so why concern myself with someone else's? But I figured it was about time I emerged from my cave and familiarized myself with this icon of pop culture and cinema. Now I have a short list of observations I made while watching A New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back, and The Return of the Jedi. Ready? ok. (Be warned, here there be spoilers).

First thing's first. The Imperial troops and generals and such look like Nazis. I'm assuming that is because it would force people to conclude that the Empire is bad. I mean, anyone that you can link to the Nazis is evil to his very core, right? On the subject of costume, I always thought Darth Vader looked pretty imposing. All in black, big flowy cape, helmet with badass James Earl Jones voice modulator. But then, seeing him surrounded by stormtroopers, I realized, he's just a black storm trooper with a cape. He's the Batman of stormtroopers. You can imagine how crushed I was to find that in the end, Darth wasn't really the Big Bad, nor was he even irredeemably bad. He had the badass helmet removed and that was it, he became uncle Fester.

Many Star Wars characters reminded me of other movie characters. Yoda, for example, is like a little green Mr. Myagi. He seems a bit odd and eccentric when we first meet him, he has odd teaching methods, a he's a wrinkly squinty-eyed fighting master. Daniel Larusso must have been like "Whoa, I've seen this movie before, I have to use the Force to beat the Cobra-Kai". Another character who reminded me of someone else was C3po. He reminded me of Abraham Sapien, the fish-man from Hellboy (yes, I explained Abe Sapien but not Mr. Myagi because really, if you don't know who Mr. Myagi is, shame on you). They spoke the same, had similar gestures, and similar mannerisms (the awkwardness for example). The difference of course was that I actually like Abe Sapien, whereas C3po irritated the shite out of me. He was pretty useless except for the fact that he cut down on subtitles by translating for a couple of characters, including R2d2, who wasn't much more useful except as an occasional plot advancer and multipurpose tool.

Another character I didn't like: Jabba the Hut. First of all, what the hell is a Hut? And is he the only one? He's probably the fattest one. I find it ridiculous/hilarious how, in fantasy films that include strange species previously unseen, the most humanoid will always be the hero, and the least, the villain. For example, Jabba is an evil bastard, and thus sluglike and vile beyond all reason. The very innocent dancer that he condemns to be eaten in an underground pit, is obviously a green human with head trunks, but really mostly human. But I digress. The worst thing about Jabba and his sequence (in Return of the Jedi) is his creepy little den of sexual exploitation. it's a slightly disturbing scene to me because a) an obese slug and sex should NEVER go together, b) half of his sexy dancers and singers aren't humans, but odd alien creatures bearing no human resemblance; it was like sexualizing a bug (which is one of the creepiest fucking things imaginable). And really, Jabba seemed to me to be a greater evil than the Emperor. I mean, what did we really see the emperor do? We were told he is a follower of the Dark side of the Force, but does he really do anything wrong besides try to recruit Luke to his baddie team? There don't seem to be many examples of oppression or poverty in the empire, everyone seems relatively chill with their lives. but Jabba? He's a gangster/slave trader/creepy sex fucker. That, in my mind, is way worse than the government trying to keep rebels from rebelling and trying to get the most (potentially) powerful guy on their team. I mean that, Luke is space Hercules. He's destined to overthrow or destroy his dad and everyone treats him like demigod royalty. And he has all these tasks!

But overall, my greatest observation was that space adventuring is a lot like sea adventuring was back in the day (early 1500s). Exploring new lands with a trusted crew, defeating the bad guys ie smugglers (or smuggling yourself eh Han Solo?), and trading with the different planets and systems you come in contact with. I think Disney's Treasure Planet really sends this one home, but films like Star Wars and Star Trek started the notion I think. And maybe that's why people are so intrigued with space travel. I mean, who doesn't want to explore new lands and experience adventure with a group of stalwart buddies on your team? So George Lucas, I think you've got a new spacer on your team. Maybe I didn't used to like space fantasy, but there are so many interesting worlds to explore. How could I resist?

So goodnight everyone in cyberspace. I hope you enjoy your dream adventures.

Once There Was the Sun

Gosh I just love sunshine. The way it streams into the house early in the morning, like so much molten air, it's just so beautiful and uplifting. I even like the word "Sunshine", It's fun to say. I don't like the heat though, I hate sweating and bugs and humidity. I also love the rain, particularly a nice hard downpour or, even better, a lightning storm. Sometimes when there is a storm late at night I just sit up in bed and watch the flashes of light burn across the sky. I could walk in drenching rain and be ecstatically happy. I read somewhere that lightning is an aphrodisiac to alligators; maybe it has a similar affect on me (although I don't actually get horny haha). I also feel a particular attachment to the moon. I love the moon. Full moons make me happy; I make it a point to howl at every full moon. No really, it's true. I'm not some mad person who thinks I'll change into a creature of the night or something, I just feel that the moon has some sort of connection to all life. It makes things happen, it affects people and changes. Heck, it affects the tides, I think it deserves a bit of reverence.

Okay, I'll change subject now, I'm sure my musing on the power and beauty of nature can get boring (although admittedly, it could fit a whole post). I'm trying to think of a title for this post and it's pretty hard. In fact, coming up with a title for this blog was also hard. I wanted something interesting and smart but I couldn't think of anything that wasn't cliche. I finally chose On the Edge of My Brain because that's the feeling you get when you're trying to say or remember something but it won't quite come out. most people say "on the tip of my tongue" but I've always felt as though whatever it was that was stuck wasn't sitting on the tip of my tongue but standing at the edge of my brain, afraid to jump. I liked On the Edge of My Brain because it was an expression that I didn't think many people used (what with the popularity of the tip of everyone's tongue) so it was uniquely me. I also wanted my blog to be about all the things I want to say when they just pop into my head, or something I've been thinking about or trying to figure out all day. Something stuck in my head that I've been dying to get out. I know I've really just written personal musings so far and I'm sure no great philosophical or scientific theories will appear in future posts, but I felt that what I had to say was interesting and important, if only to ensure that I had a voice in the vast hourglass of the universe.

Even after I chose it though, I wasn't sure On the Edge of My Brain said everything I wanted to say. It's so difficult to represent your whole self in one short sentence or space in time, because people are more than just their current favourite lyric or whatever else most people post as MSN names and Facebook statuses (yes that is the correct pluralization). I guess that's why I could never get a tattoo. How could my whole mad self be depicted in a faerie or a quotation or flowers growing out of the eyes of a skull held in the hands of Jesus with koi fish all around (every tattoo EVER)? I'm more complicated than that and I'm going to keep adding layers to myself until I'm this great big onion of mystery.

anyway, I guess that's all I was thinking of this morning and I wanted to share it with someone. I wish you all a good day and I hope you enjoy whatever sun, rain, or snow is streaking past your window and possibly into your house. And howl at the moon. Trust me, it feels wonderful.

Too Late to be Witty

Have you ever read the book Hard Love by Ellen Wittlinger? I can't describe it without giving the end away, but suffice it to say that the characters meet through the publication of zines, which are basically paper blogs. That's what I think of when I think of blog entries, so I might lapse into the format of Marisol or John (main characters).

This is my first post on this blog and probably my second or third EVER on any blog. As stated in my title, It's a bit late and I'm a bit drained for witty repartee, but I wanted to get in a sort of intro post so I wouldn't spend the next three weeks panicking over what to say on an empty blog. It's easier to get this sort of stuff done at night; people do things when they're tired that they might never do otherwise, and I'm kind of like that. I will tell you ANYTHING when I'm exhausted.

I don't really feel like handing out specifics on the Internet, but if you must know, I am female (dur in case the name didn't tip you off), enjoy reading, writing, dancing, and a lot of other girly things, although I'm also kind of like a dude in that farts don't gross me out and I like my steak bloody (and other "manly" things). I suppose you'll get to know me better as we go on so I don't want to put in too much right now and turn this into a "What I did for my Summer Vacation" type paper. you know, the 3rd grade info dump. Oh, and I'm not in third grade, I go to university. I know some people are finicky about the age and "sophistication" of the blog they're reading.

Okay, finally before I sign off, this is my blog and I'd like to be able to publish my own feelings and thoughts without getting shit on for having them (oh yeah, this blog will have swearing. that is one of the main reasons for the warning at the beginning). Stop Rambling....... So yeah, if commenters are rude to me or to each other, I'll delete the comments but please, don't make this unpleasant. Maybe I don't like Twilight, maybe I think homosexuality is okay, maybe I'm a cannibal, but I didn't sign into this so that I could read comments that make me hate the world and want to scream. I could just read the comments on youtube if I wanted that. And no, I am in no way trying to tie homosexuality, Twilight, and/or cannibalism together so chill.

So sleep well and I hope we can all be friends.