Here tiny human. Pick it up and throw it away. Then I’ll go get it!
OH MY GOD!!!
sounds like strax to me
This toy makes me happy. I will give it to you, and then you will be happy too.
why is the female hero so often tomboyish
why cant there just be one like oops i chipped my barbie pink nail polish while brutally killing an entire armada of time traveling ninja pirates
with my hair curler
nvm
found her
Um…
Didn’t that stereotype get broken a generation ago? Just sayin’…
Funny Story
My blog has been full of serious and needs a bit of funny.
When I was 25 I was training as a teacher in a school 50 miles away from where I lived. Now - in America, 50 miles is not a long way. In the UK, it’s a nightmare sometimes. The school was in the rural north of the country and I was placed for the winter term. It took an hour and a half to get there in the morning and the same time for to get home at the end of the day. 3 hours travelling per day took the hell out of me, not least because both journeys took place in the dark and I suffer from SAD.
However, as bad as it was for me, it was worse for my long suffering housemate R, who was on the same placement and was the only one of the two of us who could drive. I don’t know if I ever said thank you for that adequately. But anyway. Funny story.
I used to go to sleep in the car sometimes, I was that foggy and rubbish. Sometimes I was so tired at the end of the day I’d doze off for 20 mins in the car at the start of the journey home.
A couple of weeks into the placement, I had this dream about seeing tigers in the field next to the road. I shrugged it off, I was wired and not sleeping well and stressed. No big deal.
A few days later, the same thing happened. More dreams about tigers in the field. I thought this might be my stress reaction for the placement. I looked it up in my dream book, but my dream book wasn’t that good to start with and there were no mentions in there.
In the run up to Christmas, I had another dream on the way home. Only this time, I was seeing elephants in the field.
I shit you not. Elephants. In the north of England. Tigers was one thing, but now I was seeing Elephants.
A short way down the road, I turned to R and said ‘Look, I might be crazy saying this, but there isn’t an elephant in the field, is there?’
R grinned.
‘No you’re not crazy, I can see them too’.
…
‘You do know the local zoo is over there, right?’
‘No… I thought I was seeing tigers in my dreams!’
R laughed.
‘You go to sleep more often than you think. You only see the tigers, or the elephants now that they’ve moved the enclosures around, when you’re awake. Settle back. Get some rest.’
The moral of the story? Sometimes there really is a tiger in the field, even when you think you’re crazy.
I think we should all celebrate by taking a moment to appreciate Robert Pattinson’s attitude and I’m laughing so much right now.
JUST ALL THAT HE IS.
I mean
LOOK
Robert Pattinson’s ‘Twilight’ commentary.
I just
I’m going to miss this
Who would have thought he hated Twilight so much?
This guy.
He hates Twilight more than Stephen King.
He hates Twilight even more than George Takei.
A student blows up at a teacher, drops the F-bomb. The usual approach at Lincoln – and, safe to say, at most high schools in this country – is automatic suspension. Instead, Sporleder sits the kid down and says quietly: “Wow. Are you OK? This doesn’t sound like you. What’s going on?”
He gets even more specific: “You really looked stressed. On a scale of 1-10, where are you with your anger?” The kid was ready. Ready, man! For an anger blast to his face….”How could you do that?” “What’s wrong with you?”…and for the big boot out of school. But he was NOT ready for kindness.
The armor-plated defenses melt like ice under a blowtorch and the words pour out: “My dad’s an alcoholic. He’s promised me things my whole life and never keeps those promises.” The waterfall of words that go deep into his home life, which is no piece of breeze, end with this sentence: “I shouldn’t have blown up at the teacher.” Whoa.
“
| — |
Lincoln High School in Walla Walla, WA, tries new approach to school discipline — suspensions drop 85% (via mchotdog) what a radical idea yo (via matthewdgold) Bam. Kids “misbehave” for actual, real, valid reasons. And have feelings. (via amydentata) For fuck’s sake, it takes the people in charge so long to figure shit like this out! Good for Lincoln High! (via psychetimelapse) This needs to be the policy EVERYWHERE… (via 3dela) Seriously. (via iwantthewater) As much as I love this, it’s important to remember that the demands of being a teacher often extend what can reasonably be expected from a human being. We’re absurdly busy and much of our work is emotionally draining, so sometimes we literally don’t have the time or energy to act as a semi-counsellor to all (or even some) of our students, especially given that it’s not usually in our job description, and doing so can put us into complicated, high-stakes legal situations. Students can also be disruptive for valid but dull reasons, like, “this class is boring,” “this class is poorly-structured,” “we haven’t been set any boundaries for behaviour”, “the boundaries the teacher set are unreasonable” (all of which are solvable problems), but sometimes students just don’t like you, or they’re tired, or they want attention, or they’re not very mature - all of which are understandable issues, but they’re not easily fixed and often are influenced by a metric fuckton of factors that you as a teacher have no control over. There’s a *lot* of reasons to misbehave in a class, and sometimes we just don’t have the time to figure out why a student is misbehaving. Another potential issue is that if you go too far with the understanding-kids’-feelings approach, you can end up like Nr. O’Neill from Daria, and be completely ineffectual and disrespected by your students. It’s not fun, and it’s not nice, but sometimes you have to be a taskmaster. This isn’t to say that teachers shouldn’t try to be patient, kind, and forgiving with their students, but sometimes it’s just not possible to take on that kind of pastoral role in the face of everything else we have to do. (via auntytimblr) The army recruits I taught for a few years were teenage boys who, it has to be said, had largely been let down by everyone around them. Families, education system, justice system, the works. Many of them said to me that when they walked into Army Careers and expressed interest in being a soldier, it was the first time in their lives that anyone took an interest in them. In their career, their qualifications. In feeding them, clothing them, housing them, training them and paying them to do a job. Which was great, but to get their they had to pass my English course which was part of the army preparation scheme they signed up for if they were under 18, before they went to do their selection tests. I’m not a small girl, I’m 5’8 and fairly well built. I’m not your 5’2” made of glass little girl, by any means. But these guys dwarfed me. They’d had their growth spurts, most of them were working out and running 4-5 times a week, they were big guys. And I was required to keep order in a fairly raucous classroom. I had a lot of fun, but sometimes it got scary. This was the time I remember most. One day I had a boy (let’s call him Al) blow up in my class room. He was 17 years old, he was obviously not having a good day. He arrived late and I jokingly wagged a finger at him to let him know I’d noticed. I gave him a work booklet and he immediately complained of a headache and 5 minutes later he turned his desk over and stormed outside. I had never had trouble with Al before. I’d had regular low level disruption in early lessons as these boys were the MASTERS of making teachers they didn’t like suffer. I had done well to win this class over, quite frankly, and things had settled down. This blew all the calm out of the water. My face showed I was angry and these boys had seen all that before on a teacher’s face. Chaos. Utter chaos. The other boys went mad, assuming that I would throw him out and assumed that he would be kicked off the course. I blew my whistle for silence and they listened to what I actually had to say. I said perhaps Al wasn’t well and asked them to continue their work while I went outside and spoke to the boy. Things simmered down, this teacher was going to ask questions rather than leap tall conclusions in single bounds. One of the others (let’s call him Bob) offered to come with me in case Al got violent. Al could have put Bob onto a sandwich and eaten him, the height difference was absurd, but I was touched that Bob offered. I said no. Outside I found Al, storming around the exercise yard, head in hands. I asked him if he wanted to talk and was he ok. He turned around and said ‘You not mad at me? I’d be mad at me. I am mad at me!’ I said ‘Well, that’s enough mad for both of us, so how about you tell me what’s up? You’ve never done that before’ He walked around a bit more, shaking out the steam, then came over and apologised for being late. Al had recently moved back in with his Dad after some time in foster care. It wasn’t going well. He’d slept in and his Dad had already gone to work when he got up. There had been two bits of bread left last night, but when Al got up, his Dad had eaten both and not left one for him. There was no milk, no cereal. Not much at all in the house in fact. Al missed his bus and was starving, he was a 6’2” guy. And rather than miss the course, he had run 3 miles along the bus route to get to my class. For all that, he had only been 5 minutes late. He had a headache and couldn’t concentrate. Al knew he was out of line, he apologised. I went back in with him and called a 15 minute break for the class while I marked their work. This was a regular tactic for me, it broke up the three hour session, it gave them a rest and gave me a rest and allowed for some immediate feedback on their work. The boys often used this time to go get something to eat or drink for the shop around the corner. Al, the one who had no breakfast and a hunger headache, offered to stay and redo the work, and was already picking up and fixing his desk. I shooed him out to go get food. On the way out I heard Bob telling Al that he’d offered to stand up to him. All smiled, put him in a headlock and ruffed up his hair. Good humour restored. While they were out, the CO of the programme came over and said the boys had told him what happened while I had been outside, was I ok and did I want to remove Al from the class. I explained things and his face softened a bit. He had grown up in a house similar to Al’s and eventually joined the army to leave home at 15; he served for 23 years in the Fusileers. I proposed a plan. The CO agreed to give it a try. I discussed it with the boys and they were in favour. The next week, we started 30 minutes early and each boy brought a contribution of 50p. There was toast and coffee first before the lesson. The contributions were enough for a loaf of bread, a pint of milk and a jar of coffee. I brought margerine spread from home. Brain fuel. I had better discipline and better outcomes in class as a result of this and I realised how many of them had been going hungry due to not getting food at home. I continued this for the rest of the course. Sometimes the boys brought biscuits or a bit of milk from home if they didn’t have money. They would also make me a cup of tea during the lesson break while I marked their work. It was so good for the discipline that I trialled it at the other schemes I was working at in other towns. It worked at one of them, but not at the other - you can’t win ‘em all. I learned a big lesson that day. Strong emotions do not exist, or manifest, in a vacuum. And a loss of control does not automatically mean a loss of respect. Al passed his tests by the way. He’s serving in the infantry in one of the northern regiments. Had I kicked him out, Heaven knows where he would be. (via Ladycluck) |
Everyone who reblogs this will get the title of a book to read based on their bio/posts.
Everyone. I mean it.
THIS IS THE BEST POST
I HAVE EVER SEEN
EVER
they really do mean everyone
mischievous-mouse replied to your post:
I like your interpretation and I agree that everyone is a blend of manly and effeminate traits. But it’s funny that people equate LARP with effeminate. It is about battles, political intrigue, etc i know more manly men that play than girly women
Good point!
It’s something about LARPing being ‘geeky’ I think. And that it’s not REAL battles or fighting, it’s just pretend. It’s ACTING essentially, and I think acting is perhaps widely considered as a not manly profession? THEATRE, certainly, is considered that way.
This would be an interesting thing - to collect public opinion on the things that are manly or not.
With LARPing, now I think about it, it’s perhaps not that it’s considered effeminate, but that it’s not quite a ‘manly’ thing to engage in. And since the opposite of manly is effeminate, people assume that’s what LARPing must be. Whereas actually it’s neither?
Just like people aren’t either one or the other, neither do hobbies or professions fall easily into one category or the other, I guess :)
I keep running into this lately, the idea that Larp is effeminate, or at the very least ‘not masculine’. I must stress Holly, this is not an issue with your reading of supernatural or your Meta, and I’m not writing this because of your interpretations. Your interpretation is spot on in a way, because that is how people DO view larp.
But as someone who has been involved in larp as a hobby, I am tired of it being viewed this way, and I feel l that at this point I have to put across an alternative experience. Because saying nothing is making me feel like I’m endorsing what I keep hearing, when I know it to be inaccurate or at least not the whole of the picture.
At least one friend I have credits his involvement with larp with saving his life and redefining his view of what it means to be a man.
He was a kid from one of the rougher areas of Manchester, an area which was hit pretty hard by poverty, where there was a lot of street violence and a tendency towards getting involved in gangs and anti-social behaviour. Not many jobs, not many prospects, not many ways forward in life, not many ways out either.
This friend, let’s call him ‘R’, had few qualifications, if any. He had a history of juvenile delinquency and was headed for a life of crime with few other options.
He met my boyfriend, and another friend - let’s call him ‘N’. N was from the same area of Manchester, but he had been away to study at University, so he had a wider view of life. My boyfriend and N were, and in N’s case still, involved in a national larp, known as the Lorien Trust. It attracts upwards of 3,000 people to it’s summer event in August each year and many hundreds to the smaller satellite events. It’s roughly based on mediaeval Europe but it is a fantasy setting at heart, with dwarves, elves, etc wandering round the field and campsites.
N took R under his wing a bit when they met. Taught him how to fight with a sword. How to use a shield. How to keep in shape, keep fit, keep his stamina up. How to fight and train as part of an organised unit. How to have discipline. How to have self control.
It changed R’s life.
It was the start of something totally different for him. We spoke about this a couple of years ago when he and I met at a party N was throwing. R credits N and my boyfriend with saving his life. He said that the two of them gave him ‘a definition of being a man which was not based around crime and violence’. They taught him to value creativity, to value story telling as a way of releasing aggression and stress.
R still lives in the same area of Manchester. He still goes to the national larp events. He also runs a youth club for kids who are just like he used to be. He gives them a role model, just like N used to do for him. He runs keep fit sessions, training sessions. He’s won awards for the work he does with the club.
He says quite openly that none of it would have happened if he hadn’t gotten involved in larp. And he views it as quite the opposite of effeminate.
I hope…
You know what I hope?
I hope that in years to come you see me again. Across a room somewhere.
Now that I am fitter and trimmer than ever.
More successful in my career (yes, career, not job) than ever.
More glamorous than ever with my long nails and shining long hair.
Now that I am happy and escorted by a man who I love, who is besotted with me. Who would do anything for me.
I hope that you see me with all of this going for me. Now that I am everything I could have been, with the right love and support.
I hope that you see me. Really see me. And see everything in me that you failed to give me.
I hope you see me and I will smile and wave and go back on with my life and leave you standing. Watching. Just like you once left me.
