Never let the truth get in the way of a good story

since you are my personal rant space LJ i will let you in on a secret. i'm a tomboy and a butch dyke at that. but wait? you might ask, that makes no sense! while it is true that a fulfilling day for me can include any and all of: shooting things, fixing electronics, playing video games, driving fast cars, drinking expensive scotch and smoking a pipe, the end of that day will often be a soothing bubble bath followed by me curling up in front of the tv in my robe and watching a movie that will make me cry for weeks. enjoying loud and crazy things doesn't make me less of a woman, it just makes me a more excited one! not to mention i'm always thrilled about going out dressed up in a pretty dress and having a good time. of course then there is the whole disappointment in how my chest hasn't filled out and how awkwardly large my genitals feel (plus they're an outie not an innie!). i don't think it's bad to be a tomboy, and anybody who thinks it make me not a girl can DIAF!

<3 skoddie

So my sister-in-law and brother who live in North Carolina came to Minnesota together for only the second time for the holidays. On the way home from the Christmas celebration at my uncle's house, a few of us were for some unknown reason humming Battle Hymn of the  Republic.

Me: You know what's really cool? Mark Twain wrote an awesome version of Battle Hymn of the Republic, a satire. I don't remember much of it but it's definitely worth looking into.

Sister-In-Law: Wait, Mark Twain is a singer, right?

Me: *looks at her for a moment hoping she's being facetious...she isn't.* No...Mark Twain was an author.

S-I-L: *blank stare*

Me: ...Tom Sawyer?

S-I-L: OH!!* laughs* Then who's the Twain singer?

Brother: *shakes head* That would be Shania, babe.

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One of my friends the other day asked me "So are you transitioning to be happier?" This actually made me think because transition has not made me happier, at least not yet. It has made me much happier with myself but I don't think it made me happier as a person since I deal with a lot more crap now compared to when I started to transition. Not to mention the money I have spent on transition would have meant a much easier life if I was not trans. But the one thing I have gained is I actually feel like I'm alive now. Before everything felt like I was sleepwalking through life. So no, transition has not made me happier, but it has given life to me.

I tried to explain this to my friend and a therapist once but neither one really understood. So I am wondering does this make sense to anyone here?

There are times and places when the phrase "As if by magic" can be used well.

A situation where actual magic is occuring is not one of them.

Edit: Character in question was perfectly aware of the magical reality, to clarify.

There's, what, 8,000 Dean Winchester muses... are any of them written in-character?

Dialects can be tricky. Some might argue that you shouldn't write dialog in dialect at all, but I disagree; when done right, it can bring that extra hint of flavor that makes a story.

However.

If you want to write a character's lines in dialect, pay attention to the dialect in question.

Not all British dialects are like Cockney.
Not all US accents resemble a Texan drawl.

OK? Because I'm tired of - for example - reading Across the Universe fics where Jude sounds like a Londoner. If you can't do it right, don't do it at all!

What if the Doctor decided what hand you write with? “You look like a leftie, so I say you're a leftie and that's the way it's going to be for the rest of your life. Congratulations mom, you had a leftie.”

Lefties and Righties look physically different. They play different social roles, wear different clothes and associate with their peers differently than with their “opposites”. Some people say that whether you're a Leftie or a Rightie is proclaimed by god. Others say that it's genetic. Some claim that handedness is completely socially constructed and neither Lefties nor Righties are superior to the other. BUT (and this is huge) no self-respecting Leftie would ever want to be a Rightie. Only Perverts would do that. Anyone who would want to be what they're not is sick in the head, and probably a deviant on top of that. So what do you do if in spite of all that you know you're really a Rightie?

You look like a Leftie, but still, all your life you've known that you're really a Rightie. It only makes sense to you; it's the way you've always felt. So you want to do the things that Righties do, wear what Righties wear and look like a Rightie. Everyone you tell this to looks at you like you're insane because they see a Leftie. They call you a pervert, send you to mental hospitals, say you're sick, evil, going against the word of god, going to go to hell. Nobody takes you seriously, nobody watches you use your right hand because that's deviant behaviour. It's even listed in the DSM: “Handed Identity Disorder” and they're trying their damndest to get it listed as a paraphilia because it fits their biased notions and they know better because they're the experts after all.

When you're a child, you learn that even talking about cross-handed behaviour is Wrong. You get teased in school, and even bullied. You get punished at home, called a sinner in church, sent to the Office in school which leads to still more punishment at home. So you learn to hide your feelings. You learn to act like all the other Lefties act, often overcompensating to make up for your uncertainties. Sometimes this is enough. You can fake your way through life. Lots of people do. Being miserable isn't that difficult a life, is it? But sooner or later you hit the wall. You can't take it any more. The pain of being wrong is just too much.

So what do you do? Sneaking out and crossdressing as a Rightie helps, sometimes. You have to go where nobody knows you and even then it's risky, because dressing as a Rightie threatens the Lefthood of all the other Lefties and they may beat the hell out of you for daring to insult their Leftliness. They may even kill you, and justify it by telling themselves that you deserved to die because you deceived them and made them homodextrous.

Supposing that you don't get attacked, you still may get sneered at for being a deviant, have your identity decided for you by people who know what you “really” are and oh, so smugly inform you that you didn't fool them. Even after all that, it's still easier than trying to pretend that you're a Leftie.

So you try and change things. You go to a Therapist who specialises in treating Handed Identity Disorder. You talk for months about how you've always known, never daring to stray away from the established narrative because other transhanduals have told you horror stories about how you can be refused treatment if you don't pander to the prejudices of the doctors and you'll be stuck living in misery for the rest of your life, if you don't kill yourself out of despair first.

Finally you get permission to live the way you've always known you need to. You take Rightie hormones that slowly begin to alter your body to look like a Rightie. You change your name, and start living full time in your chosen handed role. You throw out your whole wardrobe and buy a new one, piece by piece. You may lose your family, your friends, your job, but that's a small price to pay now that you can finally pick up a pen and write naturally for the first time in your life.

Xposted in my journal.

Dear Friends author, I sincerely doubt Joey Tribbiani would ever touch Emma Geller Greene. Even though she's eighteen. For one thing, Joey was in love with Rachel. For another thing, she's the daughter of two of his best friends!

And really, if Joey got Emma pregnant and they decided to get married, why exactly would he tell Ross and Rachel over the phone? That doesn't seem like the best plan here. I sincerely think Ross would go after Joey and try to kill him or something.

And why did Ross and Rachel name their second daughter Emily Carole? Not only do they already have an Emma, those are the names of Ross' ex-wives. I don't see Rachel going for that. Who names their kid after their ex-wives anyway?

That was the most horrible Friends fic I have ever read.

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You'd rather RP with other people besides me? Fine. Even if you don't, you still don't want to RP with me (even though you don't say that. You're always "busy", although I can clearly see you aren't.) Fine.

When I say I'm thinking about killing the character off because all of her connections to people are weakening or severed altogether, you try to tell me not to, and to make her disappear instead (which...wouldn't that be worse?). No. That's not so fine.

If you don't give me the time of day RP-wise, you have no right to tell me, or even suggest to me, what I should do with my character.

I have decided not to kill that character off, because some people have told me that they want to help me liven her up some more, which I am grateful for. But I still don't want to RP with you. You can guilt-trip me all you want, but I got really tired of you ditching me, for people infamous for stirring up OOC drama. Ditching me in general was bad enough.

Our characters are supposed to be adoptive brother and sister. No, I don't think they should spend every single day together. But I don't see the point of them having that relationship, if it's never RP'ed out. It's like you want to keep it that way to make your own character seem shinier, being the awesome older brother and all, even though you can't take even five minutes every week to RP their relationship out.

But, yes. I am the bad guy here, and you're the only one trying to keep them together. Go die in a fire.

Someone at the"pit"posts a story with an interesting disclaimer. Seems they tried to get permission from the actual author to change the names of the characters and post it to a different fandom. Getting no reply, they post it anyway, because it's such a great story. Number of reviews pointing out that doing this without the author's permission is wrong: four.

Four reviews, out of one hundred eight. The rest are of the OMG! UR SUCH A GREAT RITER! RITE MOAR! variety. One reviewer gushes about how much she loved the original story! For me, the saddest one was the one that suggested that even though this person didn't write the story, they should write a sequel and up the rating, cause it's so hot.

Am I wrong for thinking this is really bad?

Honey,

I know spelling can be a bitch. I really do.

...But seriously. If someone comments on your fic that it was very good even though you kept spelling no one as noone, the correct response would be something along the lines of "oh, thanks, didn't know that, will fix it." The correct response is NOT "I can spell it however I want, that's how I was taught it's spelled, don't read it if it bothers you."

Sincerely,
Me.

Sherlock Holmes '09 fandom, you're less than a week old and already you're making with major fail.

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Well I just have a couple of things that bug me. One is useing, "is all" at the end of a sentence when a character isn't southern...I don't know it's just distracting. Another is super short chapters that have maybe two scenes then it ends. Lastly and most importantly are abandoning fics and long times between updates. Look I know life can get in the way, as well as writers block, I myself have a fic thats been on hiatus for a very long time. It still doesn't make it any less annoying when you start reading a 20 or so chapter and then.....nothing, especially when its on a cliffy. But I supposeit comes with the territory.

p.s. what does YMMV mean?

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⌈ Secret Post #1090 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

101.

( More! )

Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 04 pages, 123 secrets from Secret Submission Post #156.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 1 - broken links ], [ 1 2 3 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 1 2 - too big ], [ 1 - would hit it ], [ 1 - ships it ], [ 1 - take it to comments ], [ 1 2 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

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