Quote of the day

"I think I knew that Nirvana had crossed over into the mainstream when I found their MTV Unplugged CD in my stepmom's van.  I mean, she's cool but not *that* cool."

-Jackie Fuller, "Teenage Kicks" radio show on The Current

Funny cos from the DIY punk scene perspective they were so mainstream by the time anyone outside of Seattle started listening to them, but yeah.  Friends' hipster hippie parents (the ones who always wanted to hang with the kids) ruined many a band this way...

It's fun getting to play that role now...  Except that 80s stuff is deemed *their* stuff now...  And not quite ironic or kitsch as that kind of reclaiming should be...  Alt pop culture is weird right now.

Oral arguments

Discrimination may reign when the decision comes out, but the oral arguments made it look as petty, small, and arbitrary as it is.  And the fact of harm to the minority and our children seems to have been conceded, implicitly.  The rationale is looking rickety as heck.

That's my armchair expert opinion, having listened to many an oral argument regarding these issues as the sands have shifted and the old bright lines have blurred and faded.

I had to laugh at the idea that "the experiment" was only four years old.  Except that it's cruel to say that to an elderly couple who's been together 40 years, or whatever.  I mean, really.

Magazine life forms

Ran across a decent read in Lightspeed,  "Let's take This Viral" by Rich Larson.  A nice tip to cyberpunk and the bodymod/ life extension story strain. 

Eleanor Arnason, local writer of Icelandic wit (dry, awesomely dry), has an interesting column going in  Strange Horizons.

And Charlie Anders has a story out that made me laugh and squirm a little, especially as a former family & probate lawyer-  Intestate.  I can't remember if I already plugged this, but I'm a big fan of the Anders story empire, not a bad one yet...  IIRC...

Check 'em out.

Nightshifted

I started reading my Clarion West classmate's series about a nurse in the special unit for vampires, werewolves, etc., Nightshifted by Cassie Alexander. 

I was putting this off because I thought it was too cheesy a premise, and the genre is het romance (though apparently there's a lesbian character later on in the series.  But my ER nurse friend loved it, and then another friend I recommended it to...  And it turns out I put down "City Boy" to find out what happens next, darn it.  I may have to renew Ed White.

The blurb:  "Nursing school prepared Edie Spence for a lot of things. Burn victims? No problem. Severed limbs? Piece of cake. Vampires? No way in hell. But as the newest nurse on Y4, the secret ward hidden in the bowels of County Hospital, Edie has her hands full with every paranormal patient you can imagine—from vamps and were-things to zombies and beyond…"

Cheesy, been done except the nurse angle.  But it's funny and moves along just right.  And Cassie knows from nursing.

Back on the road again

Two weeks in a row I have run outside for weekend long runs.  2-3 miles, sadly, is where I'm at in rehab, though this is ice runnung, which is hard on the hip flexors and glutes I injured, so I'm also being extra careful. 

Today I found that the Galactic Suburbia podcast (feminist SFF writers from Australia talking about the biz, the internets, and books) is not only good for a long elliptical workout at the gym but for long trail runs.  Music makes me run too fast...  They had a good discussion of the new Random House Hydra imprint and their questionable new contracts.

Congrats on GS's 3rd anniversary, and thanks for helping me stay off the couch a bit...

Which I will get back to now to finish The Courier's New Bicycle by Kim Westwood on the GF's tablet while she is off doing important things.  It's sort if cheesy, but reads easy, and I'm hooked.  A gender transgressive protag does not hurt, though I'm not sure yet what I think of the underlying political messages and worldbuilding.

Heireses of Russ as a concept

After finishing Edmund White's "City Boy" and "Boy's Own Story" trilogy, as  pillars of classic gay literature, focused on the eternal pull between "the life" and respectability, still as relevant as ever if in different forms, I think I need to read Russ.  Really read Russ.

I read her as a teen and early twentysomething, all Gen X and wanting more- more "satisfying" narrative in the lesbian storyline, and more nuanced feminism, more analysis of race, class, and gender as well as sexism.  Conscious of Sheila Jeffries and the 70s/80s hatred of the transsexual, as conceptual punching bag vs. reality/person, and where Russ and her comrades fell in with that.  I reread some essays and stories about a year ago and realized I didn't really have time to read Russ in any real way then.

But I keep coming across the "Heiresses of Russ" antho title and getting fidgety about that title.  I mean, are the heiresses of Russ lesbian writers, broadly speaking, or writers of lesbian-focused stories, or, as I tend to rant in my head when I see the title, angry feminists who can't just get along and jump on the QUILTBAG wagon without screaming bloody murder. 

Then I think 'heiresses,' 'legacies' in the college admissions sense, not 'envoys,' 'those who carry on the mission,' or evolution of the genetic/ ideological /methodological line.  Or simply "all you lesbians are alike,  aren't you?" In the way a family name can replace lesbians.

There are a lot of ways to parse "heiresses"- which is good, and this is not a criticism of the antho.  Just the title, because it's itchy, the way people saying "so and so is the next Octavia Butler" is itchy and fraught.

I need to reread Russ to think about this question.  The defining characteristic in her work that remains in my head all these years later is her big sword-  righteous anger- and her uncompromising approach, yet willingness to listen... until she cuts off your head.  Brit Mandelo's "We Wuz Pushed" did not change this picture in my head.  Which means I need to revisit the actual texts, firsthand, to see what's really going on there vs. what I remember with my twentysomething biases.

Is it fair to call any writer right now who is not inflaming (or flaming) people "Russ's heiress"?  Is someone like "It takes hate" or The Angry Black Woman more appropriate to anoint?  Is anyone writing razor blade criticism in the guise of fiction these days?  Sarah Schulman's "

Is anger the wrong measure/ variable?  I feel a need to look and see.  What persists- merely a name representing "the visible presence of lesbian SF," or the underlying politics, which then and now divides self-identified lesbians, much less the umbrella, such as the QUILTBAG concept strains toward.

Was the driving force, and thus, legacy of Russ the same force that ripped apart the Lesbian Conference back in the 80s and split Butch Voices into Voices vs. Nation in the aughts, or was she a foremother for "all y'all lady writers who, you know, write about likin' the ladies"?  I really am not sure.  It's time to find out instead of just ranting in my head...

Added: This makes me think about how there is no strong critical voice (especially one wrangling in a historically aware and engaged in the larger community politics of the present kind of way, as oppossd to just pushing their same personal opinions around in discussing different current issues, i.e., blogging vs. developing a line of inquiry and critical stance that is responsive to peer review in a larger way than just commenting on comments still within the one-person's blog format-  part of a larger conversation...

Which comes back around to the history, and present reality on the 'nets and off, of the specifically lesbian and female umbrella queer term of the moment inability to have a civil yet lively, honest conversation.  It's no coincidence the current stand-in for a critical forum and body of critical inquiry is "here, read this, and this, let's list everything out there, and just make more lists and leave it up to the usual non-lesbian/ queer reviewers to engage with the ideas in a critical way." 

'Cos criticism gets everyone all itchy and scratchy.  (The reviews of Gentrification of the Mind by Sarah Schulman that dwell on minor points and/or don't critically engage in the issues of history but just say "she's just wrong about our history, I don't need to explain why, it's obvious" come to mind.)  The art of argument got lost somewhere in the wake of decades of trashing as movement tactic cum implosion.  After Russ quieted down, I think.  (late 90s)

Anyway...  Thinking, thinking, this is what I am thinking about this morning as a distraction from the Powerpoint presentation on regulations in my head... More later.

The photo is a wild turkey, but she seemed sort of peacock like, seemed appropriate.  She's the neighborhood's wandering spinster...

International Women's Day

Local independent radio station KFAI is having a ton of programming today including spoken word artists from the International Women's Poetry Slam going on this weekend and local writers Rachel Gold (up for a Lammie!) and Catherine Lundoff.  I will listen as I work. 

I started a new short story today that I realized is a riff off of "O My Sisters! Your Faces Filled With Light!" by Tiptree, kind of fitting...  Enjoy the educational opportunities and good music, art, etc.  It's not easy holding up half the world...

Cyberpunk communism

Io9 has a nice spread on communist architecture of the SF bent: funky as the  sample above.  Check it out...

I "reread" Paolo Bacigaluli's story "The Tamarisk Hunter" today by listening to a podcast of it ( Original here. ) on  Escape Pod.  It made me wish more "SF" really focused on science with less sketchy economic and social context.  The interaction of branches of government, states vs. each other vs. feds vs. corporations vs. supragovernmental entities, and tech vs. human nature is well done here, as is fitting for a story about the future of water rights.

I'm deep into Edmund White's autobiography "City Boy" and his "The Beautiful Room is Empty" after being properly devastated by "The Married Man," one of the best "AIDS novels" I've read in my quest to dig them all out of the library shelves where they are buried.  His writing is addictive.  Style with a capital S.  Or something.  I must get back to it...

Women rocking out

A random find, Nadja Salerno Sonnenberg, Eileen Ivers, and Regina Carter  in concert.  (Mobile link, google it if needed...)  Awesome.

We got hit with lots of snow. I'm tired of shoveling twice a day.  Last weekend the lady and I snuck away for some upcountry Nordic skiing way outstate.  We stayed in a tiny cabin with a wood stove and outhouse and ate Norwegian/Swedish food in between hitting the trails.  We got lucky and hit a time when the snow was good and it was not bitter cold or melting too bad. 

We also got lucky because the place was very friendly, as advertised, until a jerky M.D. arriving for a conference felt the need to play gender/sexuality police.  I hope the wolves howled outside his door all night with that crazy full moon we got...

Anyway, a few photos of scenic northwestern MN up by the White Earth rez, some old school handmade skis, random signs as decor, and a caboose cabin.