Trout Nation Posts

I have cut Joss Whedon a lot of slack over the years. When he allowed the atrocity that was Buffy/Spike. When he couldn’t stop whining about networks not giving him a chance while he had two successful cult franchises in his wake. When he mentioned Firefly‘s cancellation in every interview for two years. When I realized that no matter what show he wrote, he would always be leaving out non-white characters and making women into his ultimate strong-woman-helpless-emotionally jack off fantasy in which Eliza Dushku looks slightly shocked and saddened as she punches him in the throat while begging him for help in learning the ways of love.

Okay, that last one is admittedly me losing patience with him. But his latest transgression is far and away a hundred times worse than any dickbag move he’s made so far. Buffy fans be warned, there will be comic spoilers from here out.

Joss Whedon killed Giles.

For reasons that I can only chalk up to just not giving a shit, in the January Buffy comic, Angel, who is evil again, kills Giles by breaking his neck. I remember something like that happening before. In season two. When killing a character actually meant something in the Buffy verse and before everyone expected Joyce to be back any minute.

Joss recycled Giles’s girlfriend’s death to kill Giles.

I can see what he was going for. For Giles to die by the hand of the vampire who killed the woman he loved, in the same manner as she died, years after reconciling with the man who killed her and coming to trust him enough to fight beside him, should have packed an emotional wallop. It would have been perfect, if he hadn’t waited for the series to end before he did it. You can’t do a “call-back” to an episode that aired over ten years ago and expect it to have the effect you intended. Instead, it looks like you’ve run out of ideas. And when that lack of creativity extends to a beloved character, fans are going to be pissed.

I know the Buffy comics are supposed to be canon, but as a fan, I cannot and will not accept any of the trainwreck that is the Buffy comics. No “Dawn loses her virginity and becomes a giant,” no “Buffy is lesbian now because Joss can’t function without the thought of girl parts touching and straight women who have bad enough luck with men will naturally become gay,” no “Giles is dead, aren’t I awesome at making you feeeeeel things?” The Buffy comics bear no resemblance at all to the show the I remember, and I can add that to my list of reasons why Joss Whedon is an overrated jackass.

I did an interview at Dark Angel Fiction Writing. Go check it out!

Somehow, in the course of an argument over who is hotter, Amy Adams or Idina Menzel,

(It’s Idina Menzel)

I somehow was reminded of how much I love Mister Rogers. Let me paint a picture of my childhood for you. I was raised by my loving family, most notably my maternal grandmother, who was my primary caregiver during my early childhood. My grandma Z is wonderful person, always ready to express love and able to talk to a child on their level. Especially about their fears.

Grandma Z used to do this thing that, in hindsight, is probably the reason for my enduring night terrors. She used to go in and take her bath at night, and every time she would yell, “Help, Jenny! Help!” I would come running and find the tub was empty of water, and my grandma was missing. “Grandma, where are you?” I would yell, and she would answer, from some far off place, “I went down the drain!” I would run over to the tub to peer down the drain (and now, since you’ve never seen what my grandparent’s bathroom looked like in the 80’s, you have no concept of how scary the tub was, but the walls were crumbling and the drain was all rusty and forbidding) and then, when I was frantically yelling, “Wait, I’ll get help!” she would spring from her hiding spot and scare me.

I fell for it every time. Because I was four.

Anyway, one afternoon I was watching Mister Rogers on PBS. And he had this to share with me:

“See, Grandma!” I shouted triumphantly. “I can never go down the drain!” I can’t remember what Grandma was doing at the time, but it was the kitchen. Actually, no, I do remember. She was making donuts for her dad for his birthday. And she said, “Mister Rogers is a liar.” My aunt Mary, who was a teenager living at home at the time, said, “Mister Rogers is a pervert.”

I didn’t know what a pervert was, but I knew what a liar was. It meant I could still go down the drain.

Oddly enough, even though I had been assured that Mister Rogers had lied to me, I still loved him. And I still do. I learned about hanging chads from Mister Rogers:

I learned about being cool:

Most importantly, I learned about being kind. And for all my swearing and wishing that people would burn to death while exploding in the vacuum of space, I truly am a good person. Just the other day, when I was lamenting to my mother that my kids are missing out on Mister Rogers, she said, “I’m sure you could download it from the internet.” And I said, “I couldn’t do that. It would be stealing. Stealing from Mister Rogers. And he told me stealing was wrong.”

Basically, the best piece of advice I can give anyone is, if you’re in a situation where you don’t know what to do, think, “What would Mister Rogers do?” and then do that. And remember that you can never go down the drain. No matter what my Grandma might tell you.

See, I have a theme going. Dear Author pointed out today that RWA hasn’t really done anything about sound rogering Dorchester has given some of its authors, but back when Harlequin was going to start up Harlequin Horizons, they called an emergency meeting and removed Harlequin from their list of approved publishers.

Okay, let’s look at the facts here:

Harlequin Horizons

• Harlequin announces that they are going to offer a self-publishing model.
  
• Before the service can actually launch or generate any kind of revenue, RWA calls an emergency session and boots Harlequin.
  

Dorchester Publishing

• Dorchester decides that for the next six months, all mass-market titles will be released digitally. Books scheduled for mass-market release will have their release dates moved to some nebulous time in the future, and they will be digital only. Authors who have taken out ads and otherwise spent money promoting their book are basically told to deal with it.
  
• At this point, RWA has already smacked Dorchester’s hand for not paying authors.
  
• Dorchester reverts rights to work back to some authors, but continues selling (and making a profit on) those works that are no longer legally owned by them.
  
• RWA still hasn’t made a decision.
  

It boggles my mind that Harlequin got straight up spanked by RWA because they were going to do something that possibly would hurt authors. It was a big enough emergency that RWA national had to hold an emergency session to make a decision. But Dorchester is and has repeatedly harmed authors and it’s no big deal?

Inconsistent leadership and spotty protection for authors is one of the reasons I no longer belong to RWA. Unfortunately, there really isn’t an organization out there that compares with them in terms of helping someone become a writer. So, if you’re considering joining RWA, I would say approach it the way a person who just wants a discount on makeup approaches starting a Mary Kay business: Get in, pay for what you need, get out.

I don’t know why someone felt the need to post Maura Kelly’s address in the comments to my last post, but KNOCK IT THE FUCK OFF. Maura Kelly is an idiot, but at least she’s not a fucking creepy stalker.

Recently, the enormous pile of fail that is Marie Claire magazine ran an op-ed piece by one vapid freelancer who took the opportunity to spew, like so much monkey diarrhea spraying the walls of a zoo enclosure, helpful advice for fat people.

The article is, if you want to treat your eyeballs to a feast of idiocy and self-importance heretofore unimaginable by people with souls, Should Fatties Get A Room (Even On Tv)?.

Okay, let’s just grapple with that title there. Should fatties get a room? No. No, if I have to watch people of culturally acceptable body sizes pawing over each other in the supermarket check out line because the very sight of broccoli sends their libidos into overdrive, then I am allowed to kiss my husband in public. See, it’s the “(Even on TV)?” part that gets me. It’s like she’s saying, “Of course, we all know it’s unacceptable for fat people to touch each other in public. What decent human would even question that. No, no, what we are discussing is the probability of fat sex assaulting you in your very living room!”

That is, in fact, what the article is about. Or supposed to be about:

The other day, my editor asked me, “Think people feel uncomfortable when they see overweight people making out on television?”

Her editor was talking about Mike and Molly a sitcom that has drawn criticism for it’s portrayal of two overweight people in a relationship.

But because she can’t get over her own hatred of fat people, she can’t write an article about that. Instead, she needs to warn us all about the dangers of being fat:

Hmm, being overweight is one thing — those people are downright obese! And while I think our country’s obsession with physical perfection is unhealthy, I also think it’s at least equally crazy, albeit in the other direction, to be implicitly promoting obesity! Yes, anorexia is sick, but at least some slim models are simply naturally skinny. No one who is as fat as Mike and Molly can be healthy. And obesity is costing our country far more in terms of all the related health problems we are paying for, by way of our insurance, than any other health problem, even cancer.

Now, let me address these comments one by one, because otherwise I’m going to just start screaming DIE DIE DIE DIE DIE DIE and end by throwing my laptop on the floor and stomping it to dust with my rhino-like body weight.

First of all, you cannot say something like “And while I think our country’s obsession with physical perfection is unhealthy,” and then jump right to using fucking fashion models as an example of health. If you believe you can equate the fashion industry with healthy body image, you are high. You are high on all the drugs in the world.

Second, “No one who is as fat as Mike and Molly can be healthy,” is a statement that I’m sure you, as a physician, are completely qualified to make. What? You’re a not a doctor? I’m sure I saw it in your byline… hang on…

Maura Kelly is a freelance writer who is working on a novel. She rides her vintage Raleigh as often as possible — usually wearing heels, and always wearing her helmet. (She will not be a fashion victim!) Follow her on Twitter.

Oh, that’s right. YOU ARE NOT A DOCTOR. You have no idea how to evaluate the health of any individual, let alone many, many individuals throughout the world. Either you’re too busy picking out which high heels to wear on your bike or you don’t wear your helmet as often as you claim you do.

As for your claims that obesity is costing our country epic amounts of money in health care costs… where’s your data? “And obesity is costing our country far more in terms of all the related health problems we are paying for, by way of our insurance, than any other health problem, even cancer.” That’s a fine statement to make, but on October 18 of this year, USA Today reported that obesity is responsible for 17% of our national health care spending. Seventeen. Percent. The article states $168 billion. The American Cancer society cites cancer (“even cancer.”) at costing $228 billion last year. So… I’m guess you’re not a mathematician either, then, Ms. Kelly?

She goes on to say:

yes, I think I’d be grossed out if I had to watch two characters with rolls and rolls of fat kissing each other … because I’d be grossed out if I had to watch them doing anything. To be brutally honest, even in real life, I find it aesthetically displeasing to watch a very, very fat person simply walk across a room — just like I’d find it distressing if I saw a very drunk person stumbling across a bar or a heroine addict slumping in a chair.

You heard it, fat people of America. Maura Kelly and the editors of Marie Claire find it “aesthetically displeasing” to watch fat people do anything. I don’t know, I can imagine quite an aesthetically pleasing scene, almost poetic, in fact, involving a person with rolls and rolls of fat bodily shaking a clueless and rude freelance writer right out of her heels and helmet. Seriously, what kind of a fucked up, completely backward human being do you have to be to look at an expression of love between two people and decide it that it’s gross, simply because those people look different than you do? Pretty fucked up, I think. I’m just being brutally honest here.

Now, don’t go getting the wrong impression: I have a few friends who could be called plump. I’m not some size-ist jerk.

Actually, “size-ist jerk” isn’t what I would call you at all. I would call you a vain, body-obsessed asshole who is far too invested in what other people do with their bodies. You didn’t give me the wrong impression when you compared me walking across a room to a stumbling drunk or a heroin addict. You gave me a very clear picture of what a pathetic person you must truly be in real life, if your own fear of fatness manifests itself in actual discomfort from having to just see a fat person walk.

But … I think obesity is something that most people have a ton of control over. It’s something they can change, if only they put their minds to it.

Perhaps some of us have better things to do with our minds, Ms. Kelly, than obsessing over everything we put in our mouths, or what the overweight maintenence man at the gym is doing about his body. This might surprise you, because I’m sure you’ve never experienced this, but the second you stop worrying about what everyone else on the planet is weighing, you start to do other things, like think and enjoy your life.

(I’m happy to give you some nutrition and fitness suggestions if you need them — but long story short, eat more fresh and unprocessed foods, read labels and avoid foods with any kind of processed sweetener in them whether it’s cane sugar or high fructose corn syrup, increase the amount of fiber you’re getting, get some kind of exercise for 30 minutes at least five times a week, and do everything you can to stand up more — even while using your computer — and walk more. I admit that there’s plenty that makes slimming down tough, but YOU CAN DO IT! Trust me. It will take some time, but you’ll also feel so good, physically and emotionally. A nutritionist or personal trainer will help — and if you can’t afford one, visit your local YMCA for some advice.)

Thank you so much for you completely unsolicited weightloss advice! As you are probably aware, all obese people ever eat is processed American cheese by the fistful, and we only ever get off our fat asses to lumber about distressingly in front of non-size-ist non-jerks like yourself, because we get our rocks off disgusting you.

Maura Kelly, you should be ashamed. But you won’t be. I’m sure you’ll look at yourself in the mirror and pick over your every flaw, just like you picked over the flaws of so many anonymous fat people in your article. You’ll surround yourself with beautiful people who are similarly repelled by the very existence of fat people like me, and you’ll all live in fear until the very day you die that someday, you might wake up fat. It won’t happen, but you’ll always be afraid of it. So, I feel sorry for you. Because all the advice you “helpfully” try to dispense, all the times you go to the gym, all the times you you hang out with your “plump” friends to try and feel better about your own weight, that will never alleviate the hatred you have for your own body.

Don’t pity me, I’ll just keep on pitying you.

Years ago, I worked at Meijer, which is like Walmart but bigger and Michigan based. I worked on the “cheese wall” which meant I spent my entire shift putting cheese products up in the big refrigerated case near the grocery section.

One day, a guy from the grocery department approached me. We occasionally said hello to each other, but cheese mongering is a lonely road, so it’s not like we were BFFs. He came up to me and said, “Hey. I have something I want to tell you. I’m gay.”

We were in the middle of a huge Kraft sale, and I was really busy. So I said, “So?”

He explained to me then that I was the first person he had ever come out to. He wanted to practice before telling his parents that night. He was twenty-one years old. Imagine that for twenty-one years, you knew that there was something about you that people didn’t like. And that in order to make everyone happy, you just had to deny that this part of you existed.

National Coming Out Day is a wonderful idea, but it’s a sad one, as well. It’s sad that every day isn’t a good day to come out. It’s sad that kids are still being mocked for their sexuality, resulting in the tragic consequences of the past weeks.

No kid should ever have to worry that their parents will stop loving them for being who they are. No one should ever be bullied into suicide over the way they were born or the way they weren’t born, in the case of Transgendered individuals.

If you are a closeted gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgendered or queergendered individual reading this, I hope that one day the world changes enough that you don’t have to hide anymore.

Happy birthday, John Lennon. The world will love you forever.

Today, gentle readers, I am cleaning out my laundry room. I’m sure many of you are aware that writers are not renown for their housekeeping skills. You know that scene in that horrible Stepford Wives remake where they all go to Bette Midler’s house and she’s a writer and the entire place is like a trash heap? That’s what my house is like. I know several authors will own up to that level of filth, as well. And if someone is a writer and their house is perfectly clean, they’ve either got outside help or a low word count. I’m sticking to that.

Anyway, my laundry room has gotten… out of hand. I’m going to show it to you now. I advise anyone with heart trouble or a nervous condition not look at the following picture:

Yup. That is what my laziness has wrought. A solid mass of dirty clothing at least two feet deep. I have to be straight up with you, there are clothes in there my kids have worn once and grown out of in the time since I last did a massive laundry room cleaning. It comes down the landry shoot chute (I are a writer) and straight into the pile, ne’er to be seen again.

So, today I’m sitting down here, perched atop the deep freezer, alternating between working on edits for Abigail’s January book (IN THE BLOOD, Samhain publishing, January 2011) and feeding the machines their due. I’ve got appropriately morose music playing (Tori Amos’s utterly depressing Boys for Pele) and a two litre of Diet Coke to see me through. I just have to be sure to appease the Old Gods of laundry, so as not to be consumed by the pile myself.

If I don’t return, be sure to buy up all my backlist so that I look more successful than I actually was.