One of the benefits to being sweet as pie to people is occasionally people are sweet back to you.

Like at Wild Rose, where today I was given one of the big, gorgeous peonies one of the workers there brought in from her yard.

:DDDD

Yeah, it's pretty much the best.

Although during certain finale scenes I was distracted by "SHE IS RUNNING ON GRATING IN HEELS THAT DOES NOT WORK WTF."

And the score is really great.

That's about it.

I have not got words.

But the California Supreme Court does.

"Furthermore, in contrast to earlier times, our state now recognizes that an individual’s capacity to establish a loving and long-term committed relationship with another person and responsibly to care for and raise children does not depend upon the individual’s sexual orientation, and, more generally, that an individual’s sexual orientation — like a person’s race or gender — does not constitute a legitimate basis upon which to deny or withhold legal rights. We therefore conclude that in view of the substance and significance of the fundamental constitutional right to form a family relationship, the California Constitution properly must be interpreted to guarantee this basic civil right to all Californians, whether gay or heterosexual, and to same-sex couples as well as to opposite-sex couples."

"One of the core elements of the right to establish an officially recognized family that is embodied in the California constitutional right to marry is a couple’s right to have their family relationship accorded dignity and respect equal to that accorded other officially recognized families, and assigning a different designation for the family relationship of same-sex couples while reserving the historic designation of “marriage” exclusively for opposite-sex couples poses at least a serious risk of denying the family relationship of same-sex couples such equal dignity and respect. We therefore conclude that . . . to the extent the current California statutory provisions limit marriage to opposite-sex couples, these statutes are unconstitutional."

"In the present case, it is readily apparent that extending the designation of marriage to same-sex couples clearly is more consistent with the probable legislative intent than withholding that designation from both opposite-sex couples and same-sex couples in favor of some other, uniform designation."

For unknown reasons, I've gotten re-obsessed with the Mario Opera.

Sadly, the bits of second-act music that I'd seen long ago seem to have disappeared. I really want to listen to "Summoning Luigi" again. But at least I have "Things Are Familiar" and "Freakout" and "Chorus Back and Forth" to enjoy. :D

I hope the folks doing it will finish it sometime. It's pretty great. I mean, check out the synopsis: Mario gets canon-punctured, Luigi is a PSYCHO, Bowser and the Princess break out of their original roles... It's cracky brilliance!

Me: Law offices.

Caller: *something too fast to understand*

Me: Pardon?

Caller: I'm calling from the Teamsters Union with regard to referring new clients. Is the managing partner available?

Me: I'm afraid not. Can I take a message?

Caller: You're a fucking idiot! *click*

Me: o_O?!

Which Goddess lurks in your soul? Demeter You are a true earth warrior! Demeter is the Greek Goddess of the fields, grain and harvest and inhabits those souls who long to be a part of the green. You have a special connection with plants and care deeply for the Earth. You tend to be motherly and protective of those that are in your care and are not above severe aggression when one of your charges is harmed or threatened. Click Here to Take This Quiz

Quizzes and Personality Tests

SOOZ IS LIKE A PLANT GODDESS?! STOP THE PRESSES!!!

Lack of Original Content, go!

Take My Arm, My Love

I don't obsess about this -- as in -- it doesn't eat up my days and nights -- and I'm probably about as "out" as a queer can be in this country -- but every single time I take my partner's hand on the street, or toss my arm over her shoulder or around her waist, hug her goodbye or hello, I do a little, tiny "security sweep".

( Cut for length )
I don't edit myself this way because I am ashamed of being a lesbian. I do it because I'm afraid that someone else, who thinks I ought to be ashamed of being a lesbian, might hurt me -- or worse, hurt my beloved.

( Personal response time )

The writer also challenges a straight friend:

Spend an entire week pretending that you're not a couple. Don't write a check from a joint bank account. Hide all the photographs in your home and office which would identify you as a couple. Take off your wedding rings. Touch each other, and talk to each other, in public, in ways that could only be interpreted as you being "friends". Refer to yourself only in the singular "I", never in the "we". When you go to work on Monday, if you spent time together on the weekend, include only information which would indicate that you went somewhere with a friend, rather than your life-mate. If someone comes to stay with you, sleep in separate beds. Go intentionally into the closet as a couple. For a week.

. . . .

For those of you straight allies who are not coupled, but who want to play along, your challenge is (perhaps) simpler: Spend one week in which you make no mention and give no hint of your sexual orientation at all. When straight people around you are parsing the hotness of the opposite gender, go silent, or play along in a way that makes it seem as if you are part of the gang, but never reveals any real personal information. If someone asks you about your love-life, be evasive and non-committal. If you went on a date, and you're talking about it later, de-genderize all the pronouns, or consciously switch them (him to her, her to him, etc.).

This, this right here, is why ANY -ism is bad. Anything that puts any minority person into a place where they NEED to self-edit, to constantly analyze their actions and speech, to feel like they can't act naturally in case someone from the majority will do them harm. (I focus on the minority/majority divide not because harm never happens in the opposite direction, but because the majority, by definition, has the structural power and cultural power to do greater and more enduring harm. Were it otherwise, nobody would HAVE to fight for rights.)

First of all, a post from Seeking Avalon: Walk the Line WARNING- sexual assault triggers

It covers the recent flareup on the Melissa Bruen story (there's linkage in the post, if you haven't read this particularly sickening account*) a bit, then expands on the culture surrounding things like that. It also offers another angle of why the sexful superheroine stuff we've got going on these days is not so good:

( Quotes and me going on about it under the cut )

*I'd just like to say now, please do not comment on that story here. There are other places where you can discuss it, and I'd really rather avoid talking about it at the moment. It's far too sickening and terrible.

**Not I say "probably." I am not a consumer of shonen ai, so I can't say for sure. I do know that the sexualized prettyboy covers repel me from picking them up in the first place. I am not generally interested in sexy romps outside of filthy doujinshi.